UPIRT 
GHES 


SOULS  FOR  SALE 


SOULS  FOR  SALE 


By 
RUPERT  \H UGH ES 

Author  of 

"THE  THIRTEENTH  COMMANDMENT" 

"WHAT  WILL  PEOPLE  SAY?" 

"CLIPPED  WINGS"  ETC. 


HARPER  &  BROTHERS  PUBLISHERS 
NEW  YORK  AND  LONDON 


Souts  FOR  SALE 


Copyright,  1922,  by  Harper  &   Brothert 
Printed  in  the  United  States  of  America 


HI 

SOULS   FOR   SALE 


496444 


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CHAPTER  I 

E~S  ANGELES!"  the  sneering  preacher  cried,  as  Jonah 
might  have  whinnied,  "Nineveh!"  and  with  equal 
scorn.  "The  Spanish  missionaries  may  have  called  it  the 
City  of  Angels;  but  the  moving  pictures  have  changed  its 
name  to  Los  Diablos !  For  it  is  the  central  factory  of  Satan 
and  his  minions,  the  enemy  of  our  homes,  the  corrupter  of 
our  young  men  and  women — the  school  of  crime.  Unless 
it  reforms — and  soon ! — surely,  in  God's  good  time,  the  ocean 
will  rise  and  swallow  it!" 

Though  he  was  two  thousand  miles  or  more  away — as  far 
away,  indeed,  as  the  banks  of  the  Mississippi  are  from  the 
Californian  shore — the  Reverend  Doctor  Steddon  was  so 
convinced  by  his  own  prophetic  ire  that  he  would  hardly 
have  been  surprised  to  read  in  the  Monday  morning's  paper 
that  a  benevolent  earthquake  had  taken  his  hint  and  shrugged 
the  new  Babylon  off  into  the  Pacific  sea. 

But  of  all  follies,  next  to  indicting  nations,  cursing  cities 
is  the  vainest.  And  Los  Angeles  lived  on,  quite  unaware 
that  its  crimes  were  being  denounced  in  the  far-off  town  of 
Calverly.  The  sun  itself  took  two  hours  to  make  the  trip, 
and  though  it  was  black  night  outside  the  little  church  in 
Calverly,  it  was  just  sunset  in  Los  Angeles. 

There  was  scarlet  fire  along  the  ocean  of  oceans,  whose 
lazy  waves  stroked  the  coast  with  lakelike  calm.  Over  the 
wide-sprawled  city  was  a  smooth  sky  all  of  a  banana  yellow, 
save  for  a  stain  of  red  grapes  at  the  hem  where  the  sky  went 
down  behind  the  sea  wall  of  the  Santa  Monica  Mountains. 

Among  the  multitudinous  gardens,  along  the  palm-plumed 


2  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

avenues,  the  twilight  loafed.  The  day  seemed  to  be  entangled 
in  the  jewel-hung  citruses,  the  fig  trees,  the  papyrus  clusters, 
the  hedges  foaming  with  a  surf  of  Shasta  daisies,  the  spend 
thrift  waste  of  year-long  roses,  and  the  smother  of  vines 
rolling  up  white  walls  in  contrary  cascades  and  spilling  a 
froth  of  flowers  along  the  roofs  of  many-colored  tile. 

To  the  north  lay  Hollywood,  the  particular  Hades  of  the 
cinemaphobes,  but  curiously  demure  and  innocent  in  the 
sunset. 

From  certain  surfaces  there  and  in  Culver  City  the  light 
was  flashed  back  with  heliographic  brilliance — from  acres  on 
acres  of  the  glass  walls  and  roofs  of  huge  factories,  strange 
workshops  where  the  enslaved  sun  and  the  chained  lightning 
wrote  stories  in  photographs.  Millions  of  miles  of  tiny  pic 
tures  were  taken  at  a  rate  of  a  thousand  a  minute.  Tons  of 
spooled  romance  went  rolling  all  over  the  world,  so  that  the 
girl  and  boy  who  embraced  before  one  camera  were  later 
observed  by  coolies  in  Shantung,  by  the  Bisharin  of  Egypt, 
and  the  sundry  peoples  of  Somaliland,  Chilkoot,  Jedda,  and 
Alexandropol  —  where  not?  Wherever  the  sun  traveled 
and  the  moon  reigned  they  could  watch  this  reeled  min 
strelsy  gleaming  for  the  delight  and  indignation  of  mankind. 

Even  when  the  sun  had  left  this  capital  of  the  new  art, 
some  of  the  studios  would  glow  on  with  a  man-made  day  of 
their  own.  But  most  of  the  factories  were  closing  now, 
since  the  toilers  had  begun  betimes  in  the  morning  and  were 
scattering  homeward  for  rest  or  study  or  mischief.  Los 
Angeles,  the  huge  Spinner,  was  finishing  another  day  of  its 
traffic  in  virtue,  vice,  laughter,  love,  and  its  other  wares. 

Even  Doctor  Steddon,  if  he  could  have  seen  the  realm 
he  objurgated,  would  have  confessed  that  the  devil  had  a 
certain  grace  as  a  gardener  and  that  his  minions  were  a 
handsome,  happy  throng.  But  Doctor  Steddon  had  never 
seen  Los  Angeles  and  had  never  seen  a  moving  picture.  He 
knew  that  the  world  was  going  to  wrack  and  ruin — as 
usual — and  he  laid  the  blame  on  the  nearest  novelty— 
as  usual. 

His  daughter  had  heard  him  lay  the  blame  in  previous 
years  on  other  activities.  She  wished  he  wouldn't. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  3 

But  then  she  had  not  escaped  blame  herself,  and  she  was 
in  a  mortal  dread  now  of  a  vast  cloud  of  obloquy  lowering 
above  her  and  ominous  with  lightning. 

As  yet  the  congregation  had  found  no  grave  fault  with 
her  except  a  certain  overfervor  in  the  hymns.  Her  voice 
had  a  too  manifest  beauty,  an  almost  operatic  zeal,  as  it 
floated  from  the  loft  of  the  volunteer  choir — some  of  whom 
would  never  have  been  drafted  if  they  had  not  volunteered. 

Sundry  longer-faced  members  of  the  congregation  felt 
that  it  was  not  quite  respectable  for  a  girl — particularly 
a  clergyman's  daughter — to  put  so  much  rapture  into  a 
church  tune.  But  Youth,  exultant  in  a  very  ferocity  for  life, 
harried  the  old  hymn  like  an  eaglet  struggling  upward  with 
a  tortoise. 

The  words  were  all  about  a  "joy  divine,"  but  the  elders 
kept  a  measure  in  arrears,  hanging  back  with  a  funeral 
trudge  to  save  the  day  from  the  young  rebel. 

That  one  voice,  shining  above  the  others,  had  especially 
tormented  to-night  the  old  parson,  across  whose  silvered 
head  it  went  floating  from  the  choir  loft  just  abaft  the 
pulpit.  For  Doctor  Steddon  could  not  understand  the 
seraphic  innocence  of  his  daughter's  voice.  Hearing  was 
not  believing.  He  had  known  the  singer  too  long  and  too  well 
to  be  quite  sure  of  the  purity  of  her  piety.  He  loved  her, 
but  with  a  troubled  love.  He  felt  the  vague  disapproval 
of  the  congregation  and  agieed  that  there  was  a  little  im 
modesty  in  the  poignancy  of  her  ardor. 

Doctor  Steddon — he  had  the  D.D.  from  a  seminary  that 
was  more  liberal  with  its  degrees  than  with  its  dogmas — 
had  been  impatient  for  the  choir  and  the  congregation  to 
have  done  with  their  hymn  and  let  him  preach.  He  was 
almost  ashudder  with  a  rapture  of  his  own,  the  rapture  of 
denunciation,  of  hatred  for  the  ways  of  the  world,  particu 
larly  the  newest  way  of  the  world,  the  most  recent  pleasure 
of  the  town. 

His  daughter,  glancing  across  the  choir  rail,  past  the  book 
she  shared  with  Elwood  Farnaby,  the  second  tenor,  looked 
down  into  her  father's  sparse  gray  poll,  which  was  turned 
into  a  cowl  by  the  central  bald  spot.  She  looked  almost 


4  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

into  his  mind  and  knew  his  impatience.  And  she  loved  him 
with  a  troubled  love. 

Her  father  and  mother  had  named  her  Remember — after 
one  of  the  Mayflower  girls — nearly  three  hundred  years 
after.  Her  father  often  wished  that  she  had  been  liker  to 
those  Puritan  maidens.  But  that  was  because  he  did  not 
know  how  like  she  was  to  them,  how  much  they,  too,  had 
terrified  their  parents  with  their  love  of  finery  and  romantic 
experiment.  For  it  is  only  the  styles,  and  not  the  souls, 
that  change.  There  had  been  loves  as  dire  then  as  now, 
and  sermons  as  fierce  and  as  futile  as  the  one  that  Doctor 
Steddon  was  so  zealous  to  repeat,  with  only  the  terms  and 
not  the  spirit  altered. 

And  many  an  ancient  exquisite  anguish  that  had  fretted 
the  young  she-Pilgrims  of  1621  renewed  itself  in  the  mellow 
heart  of  this  Pilgrim  of  1921.  The  fuel  was  fresh,  but  the 
fire  was  from  everlasting  to  everlasting. 

Fathers  despaired  of  girls  then  as  the  fathers  of  now  of 
the  girls  of  now;  and  as  the  fathers  of  2221  will  despair  of 
the  girls  of  2221,  the  young  and  the  old  men  of  then  and  of 
now  and  of  heretofore  being  but  rearrangements  of  primeval 
manhood  waging  in  the  eternal  pattern  the  love-wars  which 
know  no  truce. 

There  are  chronicles  enough  to  prove  that  the  same  quota 
of  the  Remembers  and  the  Praisegods  of  Plymouth  and  the 
other  colonies  suffered  the  same  bitter  beatitudes  and  frantic 
bewilderments  as  Remember  Steddon  and  Elwood  Farnaby 
endured  when  their  elbows  touched  in  the  choir  loft  of  this 
mid- Western  village.  Miss  Steddon  felt  a  sudden  tremor  in 
Farnaby 's  elbow;  then  it  was  gone  from  hers;  she  saw  his 
thumb  nail  whiten  as  it  gripped  the  hymn  book  hard.  Some 
thing  in  the  words  he  chanted  seemed  to  stab  him  with  a 
sense  of  guilt.  He  felt  it  a  terrible  thing  for  her  to  stand 
before  that  congregation  and  cry  aloud  words  of  ecstasy 
over  her  redemption  from  sin. 

Their  secret,  unknown  and  unconfessed,  was  concealed  by 
the  very  clamor  of  its  publication.  And  it  troubled  Farnaby 
mightily  to  be  gaining  all  the  advantage  of  a  lie  by  singing 
the  truth. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  5 

Then  the  hymn  was  over,  and  everybody  began  to  sit 
down  solemnly,  the  whole  congregation  closing  up  like  a 
jackknife  of  many  blades. 

Before  the  choir  had  emptied  its  lungs  of  the  last  long 
"Ah — men!"  and  sunk  out  of  sight  behind  the  curtained 
railing,  the  old  parson  was  clutching  the  edges  of  his  pulpit 
as  he  announced  his  text.  This  was  but  a  motto  on  the  banner 
of  a  Saint  George  charging  upon  the  dragon  that  despoiled 
his  flock. 

To-night  he  charged  the  newest  dragon,  a  vast,  shape 
less  monster,  the  twentieth  century's  peculiar  monster — 
the  moving  picture.  This  was  the  latest  child  of  Science, 
that  odious  Science  that  is  always  terrifying  Faith  with  its 
inventions,  its  playing  cards,  its  printing  presses,  novels, 
higher  criticisms,  evolutions,  anaesthetics,  and  archaeologies, 
musical  instruments  of  new  and  seductive  blare,  roller  skates, 
bicycles,  automobiles,  hair  ribbons,  hats,  corsets,  incomplete 
costumes,  and  all  the  other  tricks  for  destroying  souls.  The 
worst  of  all,  because  the  latest  of  all,  was  the  moving  picture! 

Though  Doctor  Steddon  had  never  seen  a  moving  picture, 
he  had  read  what  other  preachers  had  said  about  them,  and 
every  day  or  two  he  had  to  pass  the  advertisements  stuck 
up  along  the  billboards  or  in  front  of  a  gaudy  theater  that 
had  previously  been  an  almost  preferable  saloon. 

He  had  gazed  aghast  at  the  appalling  posters  with  their 
revolting  blazon  of  the  new  word  "Sex";  their  insolent 
questions  about  "Your  Wife,"  "Your  Husband";  their 
frenzied  scenes  of  embraces,  wrestling  matches,  conven 
tionalized  rape,  defiances,  innumerable  revolvers,  daggers, 
train  wrecks,  automobile  accidents,  slaughters,  plunging 
horses,  Bacchic  revels,  bathing  suits,  gambling  and  drinking 
and  smoking  scenes — everything  and  everybody  desperately 
wicked  or  desperately  good. 

He  forgot  that  anybody  in  town  had  ever  gone  wrong 
before.  The  normal  supply  of  delinquencies  appeared  to 
have  sprung  up  suddenly  as  a  result  of  these  posters. 

So  to-night  he  launched  upon  a  Savonarolan  denunciation. 
The  stenographer  who  had  tried  to  capture  Savonarola's 
eloquence  had  to  give  up  and  write,  "Here  I  could  not  go 


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on  for  tears."  There  was  no  stenographer  to  record  Doctor 
Steddon's  thunderbolts.  If  there  had  been,  it  might  have 
been  startling  to  see  how  many  of  the  same  bolts  he  had 
hurled  at  other  detestable  activities  that  interested  the 
townspeople  and  therefore  alarmed  their  shepherds.  As 
each  new  fashion  or  public  toy  had  come  into  vogue  he  had 
gone  at  it  hammer  and  tongs.  He  had  never  succeeded  in 
doing  more  than  scare  off  a  few  people  who  were  scared  to 
death,  anyway.  He  had  seen  the  crazes  steal  in  like  a  tide 
rolling  over  him  and  his  protests,  then  ebb  away  after  he  had 
ceased  to  fight.  Yet  still  he  fought,  and  always  would  do  as 
he  always  had  done.  With  equal  stubbornness  youth  went 
about  its  ancient  business  and  pastime:  girls  snickered  in 
church  and  exchanged  sly  eyeliads  with  ogling  boys; 
women  wore  the  latest  fashion  the  town  afforded;  couples 
scouted  and  flirted  during  the  very  prayers,  and  practiced 
romance  industriously  on  the  way  home.  And  to-night  the 
chief  result  of  Doctor  Steddon's  onslaught  was  the  thought 
in  the  heart  of  his  daughter  and  various  others,  "I  should 
like  to  see  Los  Angeles." 

When  the  choir  was  not  singing  openly  and  aboveboard, 
it  was  usually  busily  whispering.  Even  Elwood  Farnaby 
had  to  lean  over  to-night  and  whisper  important  news  to 
Remember.  He  was  not  permitted  to  call  at  her  house  or 
to  beau  her  home  after  the  service.  Singing  beside  her  in 
the  house  of  God — that  was  different.  He  told  her  now 
what  he  had  just  learned,  that  the  factory  where  he  was  em 
ployed  would  close  down  the  following  week.  Elwood  had 
worked  his  way  up  until  he  had  been  made  a  foreman  a  few 
months  before.  He  was  to  have  been  promoted  to  superin 
tendent  soon. 

His  firm  made  the  adding  machine  cleverly  trade-marked 
as  the  Kalverly  Kalkulator,  or  "K-K-K."  But  people  had 
suddenly  ceased  to  buy  adding  machines.  The  world's 
chief  business  was  subtraction  and  cancellation.  The  last 
of  the  uncanceled  orders  for  the  K-K-K  would  be  finished 
in  a  few  days.  Mr.  Seipp,  the  bank  president,  would  not 
advance  the  money  for  further  production. 

Even  the  contribution  baskets  that  were  passed  up  the 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  7 

aisles  during  the  services  felt  the  omen.  Those  who  had 
flung  in  folded  bills  laid  silver  down  quietly.  Those  who 
had  tossed  in  silver  dropped  copper  with  stealth.  Doctor 
Steddon  could  see  the  leanness  of  the  baskets  from  his 
pulpit,  and  it  meant  further  privation  for  him. 

To  his  daughter  the  news  that  Elwood  would  have  no  job 
in  a  week  and  would  know  no  place  to  look  for  one  had  more 
than  a  commercial  interest.  It  was  the  alarum  of  fate. 

She  had  loved  Elwood  since  they  were  children — had  loved 
him  all  the  more  for  his  rags  and  the  squalor  of  his  home. 
He  was  the  son  of  the  town's  most  eminent  drunkard,  old 
"Fall-down  Farnaby,"  a  man  whose  office  had  been  any 
saloon  he  could  stand  up  in.  Then  prohibition  arrived  and 
he  had  lacked  headquarters,  but  not  potations.  An  in 
genuity  and  an  assiduity  that  would  have  made  him  a 
great  explorer  or  a  great  inventor  kept  him  supplied  at  a 
time  when  there  was  no  legal  liquor  at  all,  and  when  what 
illegal  liquor  there  was  to  be  had  was  so  expensive  that  even 
cheap  moonshine  whisky  cost  more  than  dated  champagne 
had  cost  before. 

Among  the  slipshod  children  of  his  doomed  family  Elwood 
had  somehow  managed  to  acquire  ambition.  He  had  strug 
gled  up  through  a  youth  of  woe  to  a  manhood  of  shackled 
promise.  He  had  latterly  supported  his  mother  and  a  pack 
of  brothers  and  sisters.  He  had  even  been  able  to  afford  to 
go  to  the  war,  had  seen  France  and  won  the  guerdon  of  a 
wound  or  two  that  made  him  glorious  in  Remember  Steddon's 
eyes  and  a  little  more  lovable  than  ever,  not  because  he  won 
praise  for  a  hero's  little  while,  but  because  his  wounds  added 
to  the  burdens  that  she  longed  to  divide  with  him. 

Her  father,  however,  had  been  unable  to  tolerate  the 
thought  of  his  daughter  marrying  the  son  of  the  town  sot. 
Doctor  Steddon  felt  that  he  was  proving  his  love,  his  loving 
wisdom  toward  his  daughter,  by  forbidding  her  even  to  meet 
young  Farnaby  outside  the  choir  loft.  He  was  sure  that 
her  love  would  wear  out. 

He  did  not  know  his  daughter.    Who  ever  did? 

The  great  danger  about  the  whole  business  of  saving 
other  people's  souls  seems  to  be  that  life  keeps  mocking 


8  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

the  noblest  efforts  with  failure  as  it  mocks  the  most  high- 
minded  playwrights.  It  is  baffling  to  find  that  nothing  is 
more  effective  in  destroying  certain  souls  than  the  attempt 
to  save  them.  Such  souls  must  be  like  caged  birds  that  go 
mad  with  fear  when  the  kindliest  hand  is  thrust  into  the 
cage.  They  dash  themselves  against  the  bars;  and  if  they 
escape  from  the  tenderest  palm,  they  flash  away  to  the 
wild  woods. 

Doctor  Steddon  was  never  more  devoted  than  when  he 
warned  his  girl  to  avoid  young  Farnaby.  When  she  re 
fused  his  advice  he  forbade  her  to  see  the  boy.  She  felt 
that  she  obeyed  a  higher  duty  when  she  secretly  dis 
obeyed  her  father.  She  met  the  young  man  secretly  when 
ever  she  could  steal  away. 

Her  mother  had  neither  the  courage  to  oppose  this  stealthy 
romance  nor  the  courage  to  inform  her  husband  of  it.  The 
two  lovers  made  an  unwilling  accomplice  of  her,  and  she  was 
assured  that  they  would  marry,  the  moment  Elwood  could 
afford  to  add  her  pretty  lips  to  the  mouths  he  was  already 
feeding. 

The  factory  had  promoted  him  twice  in  its  heyday  of 
high  prices,  and  the  time  had  seemed  near  when  they  could 
afford  to  announce  their  approaching  marriage. 

And  now  the  chance  was  gone. 

And  this  meant  to  the  girl  far  more  than  a  mere  defer 
ment  of  bliss.  She  had  been  trained,  indeed,  to  regard  bliss 
as  by  no  means  a  right  of  hers.  She  had  rather  got  the  idea 
that  bliss  was  pretty  sure  to  be  indecent  sin.  Marriage  had 
been  preached  to  her  as  a  lofty  duty,  a  kind  of  higher  ordeal. 
Her  father  would  have  abhorred  the  thought  that  even  its 
rites  gave  any  franchise  to  raptures  unrestrained.  Wedlock 
to  him  was  a  responsibility,  not  a  release  from  pruderies, 
a  solemnity,  not  a  carnival. 

And  now  she  was  to  be  denied  even  that  somber,  laborious 
suburb  of  Paradise. 


CHAPTER  II 

"TJ  LWOOD  had  expected  that  the  bad  news  would  shock 
C  her.  But  he  could  not  understand  the  look  of  ghastly 
terror  she  gave  him.  He  forgot  it  in  his  own  bitter  brooding 
and  did  not  observe  the  deathly  white  that  blanched  her 
pallor. 

Yet  he  had  noted  that  she  was  paler  of  late  and  had  added 
that  worry  to  his  backbreaking  load  of  worries.  The  sunset 
crimson  was  gone  from  her  cheeks  and  her  cheeks  were  thinner 
than  he  had  ever  seen  them  before.  She  coughed  incessantly, 
too,  and  kept  putting  her  hand  to  her  chest  as  if  it  hurt 
her  there. 

Her  cough  annoyed  her  father  as  he  preached  and  made 
him  forget  some  of  his  best  points.  But  his  sermon  an 
noyed  her,  too. 

He  was  putting  himself  on  record  with  fatal  hatred  of  sin, 
and  she  wished  he  wouldn't. 

A  smile  twitched  her  lips  and  dwelt  there  at  the  mockery 
life  was  heaping  upon  his  oratory.  He  was  denouncing 
moving  pictures  as  the  source  of  all  evil.  Yet  his  daughter 
had  never  seen  one.  Yet  again  that  had  not  saved  her 
from — 

A  white-hot  wave  drove  the  wan  calm  from  her  cheek, 
and  a  scarlet  war  ensued  in  her  veins. 

She  was  the  daughter  of  Eve  and  of  Adam  and  of  all  of 
the  Eves  and  Adams  since  sin  began.  But  to  hear  her 
father  talk,  it  might  have  been  a  moving-picture  machine 
instead  of  the  serpent  that  tempted  Eve  to  knowledge  and 
started  the  eternal  parade  of  wickedness. 

To  hear  her  father  talk,  this  little  town  of  Calverly  had 
been  a  pre-Satanic  Eden  before  the  Los  Angelesian  movies 
crawled  in.  Yet  even  this  young  woman  could  remember 
that  he  had  preached  almost  this  same  sermon  against  a 


io  SOULS   FOR    SALE 

long  series  of  other  amusements.  He  had  never  found  the 
town  anything  but  a  morass  of  wickedness. 

She  felt  a  mad  impulse  to  rise  and  cry  down  at  him  across 
the  brass  rail : 

"Papa,  don't !    For  Heaven's  sake,  stop ! " 

For  the  sheer  sake  of  true  truth,  she  was  tempted  to  pro 
test  against  the  folly  of  such  a  crusade.  It  was  bad  enough 
in  a  newspaper.  It  seemed  peculiarly  heinous  that  such 
bad  logic  and  such  reckless  falsehood  should  be  shouted 
from  a  pulpit. 

But  of  course  she  made  no  sound — except  to  cough. 

The  climax  of  her  father's  appeal  was  a  jeremiad  against 
the  desecration  of  the  Sabbath. 

The  town's  two  little  picture  houses  had  proved  so  much 
more  popular  than  anything  ever  known  before,  that  they 
had  ventured  to  slip  in  performances  on  Sunday  nights 
without  interference  from  the  indolent  police. 

The  theater  managers  had  claimed  that,  according  to 
their  creed,  the  true  Sabbath  did  not  fall  on  Sunday  night, 
but  on  Saturday.  Of  course  they  did  not  close  on  Saturday 
night,  either;  but  then,  they  said,  they  could  find  nothing 
in  Moses  against  movies.  This  plea  was  resented  as  a 
heathenish  impertinence  by  the  orthodox. 

Doctor  Steddon  called  upon  his  congregation  to  make  a 
stand  against  the  "continental  Sabbath"  and  to  save  the 
American  home  from  the  danger  of  the  new  invasion.  To 
Doctor  Steddon  the  American  home  was  a  glaring  failure 
except  when  he  used  it  as  a  contrast  with  foreign  homes. 

His  daughter  was  so  distraught  by  the  sarcasm  of  reality 
that  she  felt  it  a  sacred  duty  to  rise  and  proclaim  her  secret 
to  every  gaping  listener  there.  But,  of  course,  she  denied 
herself  the  relief  of  expression. 

When  her  father  completed  his  discourse  with  his  tre 
mendous  thunder  against  Los  Angeles,  he  sank  into  his  tall 
chair.  The  choir  rose  for  the  final  hymn.  After  that  came 
the  majestic  benediction. 

On  the  way  home  under  the  wasted  magic  of  the  rising 
moon,  Remember  did  not  walk  as  usual  between  her  father 
and  mother  with  a  hand  on  the  arm  of  each.  To-night  she 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  n 

kept  at  her  mother's  left  elbow  and  clung  so  tight  to  the  fat, 
warm  arm  that  her  mother  whispered: 

"What's  the  matter,  honey?" 

"Nothing,  mamma,"  she  faltered.  "I'm  just  a  little 
tired,  I  guess." 

Her  father  felt  a  bit  lonely,  insulated  from  his  child  by  his 
wife;  and  he  had  the  orator's  afterthirst  for  a  draught  of 
praise.  He  mumbled : 

"How  was  the  sermon,  Mem?"  They  called  her  Mem 
for  short.  ' '  You  haven't  told  me  how  you  liked  the  sermon. ' ' 

"Oh,  it  was  fine,"  she  said,  "perfectly  fine.  It  ought  to 
do  a  lot  of  good,  too."  She  added  to  herself,  "But  it  won't." 
Then  she  fell  to  coughing  so  hard  that  her  father  and  mother 
had  to  stop  by  a  tree  and  wait  for  her  to  be  able  to  go  on. 

The  big  old  maple  sheltered  them  like  a  vast  umbrella 
a  moment.  Then  their  eyes  were  blinded  by  a  great  fierce 
light. 

An  automobile  came  straight  toward  them  and  ran  up 
over  the  curbstone  before  it  was  brought  to  a  stop  by  a  driver, 
who  gasped:  "Oh  dear!  What's  the  matter  with  this  darn 
thing?" 

It  was  Molly  Seipp,  daughter  of  the  bank  president, 
learning  to  run  her  father's  car  since  he  had  to  discharge 
the  chauffeur.  She  had  chosen  Sunday  night  for  practice 
in  order  to  escape  what  little  traffic  troubled  Calverly's 
streets. 

Seeing  that  the  Steddon  family  had  taken  refuge  behind 
the  bole  of  the  tree,  she  hailed  them  with  her  usual  impudence 
of  self -raillery. 

"Don't  be  afraid!  I'm  trying  to  learn  to  back  this  fool 
car.  It's  almost  as  big  a  fool  as  I  am." 

Then  she  set  the  clutch  in  reverse,  and  stepped  on  the 
accelerator  with  such  vigor  that  the  car  shot  backward  like 
a  premature  rocket  and  nearly  destroyed  the  twin  baby 
carriage  in  which  young  Mrs.  Clint  Sparrow  had  taken  her 
dual  blessing  to  visit  their  grandmother. 

But  Mem  was  coughing  too  violently  to  be  thrilled  by  the 
unusual  drama,  and  her  father  was  too  deeply  concerned  in 
her  distress  to  protest  even  against  Molly  Seipp 's  profanation 


12  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

of  the  holy  evening.  Besides,  she  went  to  the  Episcopalian 
church  and  was  doomed,  anyway. 

Doctor  Steddon  and  his  wife  stared  toward  each  other 
earnestly  through  the  gloom  and  their  hearts  exchanged 
counsels  without  words  or  looks.  The  rest  of  the  way  home 
Doctor  Steddon  was  not  a  preacher  anxious  about  his 
daughter's  soul,  but  a  father  afraid  for  her  life.  Her  health 
of  body  was  outside  the  parish  of  a  doctor  of  divinity;  that 
was  the  business  of  a  doctor  of  reality. 

"To-morrow,  Mem,"  he  said,  "I  want  you  to  go  to  see 
Doctor  Bretherick  the  very  first  thing." 

Mem  shook  her  head  and  looked  frightened.  She  was 
afraid  of  doctors  just  now;  their  information  was  occult. 
But  her  father  insisted : 

"If  you  don't  promise,  I'll  go  fetch  him  over  myself 
to-night." 

This  seemed  to  alarm  Mem,  and  she  gasped: 

"  I  promise.  I  promise !  I  don't  want  you  to  go  out  again. 
Good  night,  mamma.  Good  night,  papa.  That  was  a  fine 
sermon  to-night." 

She  did  not  linger  for  her  usual  tryst  with  Elwood,  but 
hurried  to  her  room,  pausing  on  the  stairs  for  a  long  bout 
with  her  cough.  Her  parents  waited  in  an  anguish  of  anxiety 
for  her  to  finish  it.  Then  they  put  out  the  lights  and  went 
up  to  bed. 

Throughout  the  night  they  heard  her  coughing,  a  pitiful 
little  noise  like  the  barking  of  a  sick  coyote.  They  were  on 
a  rack  of  fear,  but  their  fear  was  not  hers.  The  cough  to 
them  was  an  ominous  problem.  To  her  it  might  promise 
a  solution. 


CHAPTER  III 

NEXT  morning  Mem  went  about  her  household  chores 
and  said  nothing  of  her  promise.  When  she  was  re 
minded  of  it,  she  put  off  going  until  her  mother  threatened 
to  go  with  her.  Then  she  made  haste  to  set  out  alone. 

She  walked  around  Doctor  Bretherick's  block  two  or  three 
times  until  she  saw  that  no  one  was  waiting.  She  caught  the 
doctor,  indeed,  just  hurrying  out  to  his  buggy.  She  asked 
him  to  turn  back  and  talk  to  her.  And  she  made  sure  that 
the  door  to  his  consulting  room  was  closed. 

She  told  him  that  her  parents  were  afraid  her  cold  was 
more  than  a  cold,  and  she  coughed  for  him  and  endured  his 
investigations  and  auscultations  and  the  odd  babyishness 
with  which  he  laid  his  head  on  her  breast  and  on  her  shoulder 
blades.  He  asked  her  many  questions,  and  she  grew  so  con 
fused  and  apt  in  blushes  that  he  asked  her  more.  Suddenly 
he  flung  her  a  startled  look,  gasped,  and  stared  into  her  eyes 
as  if  he  would  ransack  her  mind.  In  the  mere  shifting  of 
his  eyelid  muscles  she  could  read  amazement,  incredulity, 
conviction,  anger,  and  finally  pity. 

All  he  said  was,  "My  child!" 

There  could  be  no  solemner  conference  than  theirs.  Doctor 
Bretherick  had  attended  Mem's  mother  when  the  girl  was 
born.  He  thought  of  her  still  as  a  child,  and  now  she  dazed 
him  and  frightened  him  by  her  mystic  knowledges  and  her 
fierce  demands  that  he  should  help  her  out  of  her  plight 
or  help  her  out  of  the  world. 

He  refused  to  do  either  and  demanded  that  she  meet  her 
fate  with  heroism.  Somehow  he  woke  a  new  courage  in  the 
panic  of  her  soul,  but  she  was  convinced  that  her  future 
must  be  one  of  degradation  in  obscurity. 

She  quoted  him  the  old  saw : 

"It  doesn't  matter  what  a  man  does,  but  once  a  woman 
slips  she  is  lost  forever." 


i4  SOULS    FOR   SALE 

"Nonsense!"  he  cried,  and  added:  "Damned  and  dam 
nable  nonsense!  It  isn't  true  and  never  was.  The  only 
ones  who  get  lost  are  the  ones  who  lose  themselves.  Don't 
run,  Mem!  Whatever  you  do,  don't  run!  Be  sorry,  and 
sin  no  more.  But  don't  run! 

"The  public  is  like  a  cat.  It  has  the  pounce  instinct.  It 
can  only  jump  on  the  mouse  that  runs.  Cats  don't  mean 
to  be  cruel  to  mice.  They  just  can't  help  springing  when 
the  mouse  tries  to  get  away.  By  and  by  they  smell  blood, 
and  then  it's  all  over.  Hold  your  head  up  and  carry  your 
cross.  And  'let  him  that  is  without  sin  cast  the  first  stone.' 
You've  heard  your  father  say  that  often  enough." 

"My  father!"  she  moaned.  "Don't  speak  of  my  poor 
father.  What  will  he  say?  What  will  the  people  think 
of  him?  He'd  never  dare  face  the  congregation.  I  must 
run  away  and  hide.  I  just  must.  Or  kill  myself.  I've  got 
no  right  to  destroy  my  father.  And  my  mother!  She  has 
had  so  much  sorrow,  and  she's  trusted  me;  and  he's  been 
so  good,  and  he  tried  to  take  such  care  of  me." 

"Care!  Who  can  take  care  of  anybody  else?"  the  doctor 
groaned,  with  a  crooked  smile.  "There's  just  one  person 
who  can  take  care  of  you  now:  the  man  who — " 

This  woke  a  pride  of  another  sort  in  her  heart.  She  was 
of  a  type  increasing  swiftly  in  the  world  (one  of  the  few  things 
called  "modern"  that  are  really  modern),  the  woman  who 
asks  no  man  to  take  upon  himself  the  whole  burden  of  her 
food,  her  clothes,  her  thought,  her  destiny,  or  even  her  mis 
deeds. 

She  lived  in  a  generation  where  the  girl  plans  to  earn  her 
living  as  the  boy  had  always  planned.  She  had  come  subtly 
to  believe  that  a  wife  should  no  more  be  supported  by  her 
husband  than  a  husband  by  his  wife. 

Her  father  loathed  and  dreaded  what  has  always  been 
called  the  modern  woman.  He  denounced  her  in  the  pulpit 
and  at  home.  For  a  time  he  had  explained  "the  wickedness 
of  these  modern  days"  by  the  disgraceful  discontent  of 
certain  women,  comparing  them  with  the  simple,  sweet,  home- 
loving  women  of  old-fashioned  days,  and  carefully  omitting 
reference  to  the  cruel,  lawless,  extravagant,  home-destroying 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  15 

women  who  were  just  as  old-fashioned  and  just  as  numerous 
in  the  days  when  he  was  young — as  he  had  known  when  he 
was  young,  but  forgot  as  he  got  old. 

But  after  the  women  of  his  congregation  had  all  become 
voters  in  spite  of  themselves,  and  he  could  see  no  change  in 
their  appearance  or  their  activities,  he  dropped  that  de 
nunciation  and  took  up  the  moving  picture  as  the  new  toy 
of  his  anxiety. 

Mem  herself  had  felt  no  stirrings  toward  scholastic  pur 
suits,  or  toward  a  professional  career  as  a  doctor,  a  lawyer, 
or  even  as  a  trained  nurse.  She  wanted  to  earn  money  only 
for  one  reason — that  she  might  ease  the  burden  of  her 
husband. 

Calverly  had  offered  little  encouragement,  however,  for 
a  womanly  career.  To  take  in  washing,  sewing,  cook,  wait 
on  the  table,  wash  dishes,  and  make  beds  for  other  families, 
to  work  in  a  store  or  one  of  the  few  factories — these  had 
made  up  the  entire  choice. 

Love  married  her  heart  to  Farnaby.  The  conditions  of 
American  society  rendered  it  impossible  for  them  to  live 
together  openly,  but  quite  possible  for  them  to  meet  and 
spend  long  secret  hours  together.  Deferment  made  their 
hearts  sick  and  tormented  their  senses.  Opportunity  was 
incessant  and  opportunity  is  close  kin  to  importunity.  They 
had  no  diversions,  no  emotional  escape  valves  of  art,  theater, 
dance,  fiction,  where  vicarious  romance  would  divert  the 
strain  on  their  souls.  Their  very  horror  of  sin  magnified 
its  temptations,  gave  it  an  eternal  flame,  an  archangelic 
importance. 

For  them  it  was  not  merely  a  dishonorable,  disgusting 
proof  of  unchecked  idealism;  it  was  a  defiance  of  God,  a 
plunge  like  Lucifer's  across  the  battlements  of  heaven  into 
the  deserved  damnation  of  hell  whence  there  was  no  return 
forever.  Perhaps  the  very  tremendousness  of  the  abyss 
carried  them  over  the  precipice  when  their  lonely  souls 
might  have  evaded  a  fall  that  looked  less  epic. 

At  any  rate,  in  spite  of  many  wildly  beautiful  battles, 
and  many,  many  victories  over  themselves  and  each  other, 
they  lost  a  few  battles.  And  a  few  defeats  were  enough  to 


16  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

annul  many  splendid  victories.  And  now  Mem  was  a 
hostage  of  shame  without  means  of  defense. 

And  it  was  her  nature  to  blame  herself  for  her  estate,  and 
to  defend  her  beloved  enemy  from  any  of  the  consequences 
of  the  war. 

When  Doctor  Bretherick  suggested  marriage  as  an  easy 
salvation,  he  revealed  to  her  the  peculiar  heartlessness  of 
her  fate.  Marriage  meant  to  her  that  two  people  went  to 
church  in  two  carriages,  drove  away  consecrated  in  one, 
and  thenceforward  lived  in  the  same  house.  That  familiar 
exploit  had  been  the  one  grand  plan  of  Elwood's  soul  and  hers. 

But  Elwood  lived  in  the  crowded  shack  which  his  father 
still  owned,  for  lack  of  anybody  to  buy  it.  The  house  was 
full  of  children,  and  progressively  the  youngest  brother  al 
ways  slept  with  Elwood.  It  was  hard  enough  for  Elwood  to 
keep  the  roof  over  their  heads.  It  was  not  to  be  thought  of 
that  Remember  should  join  that  wretched  crowd. 

At  the  minister's  house  there  was  much  neatness  and  peace, 
but  no  more  room  than  at  Elwood's.  The  progressively 
next  to  the  youngest  sister  usually  slept  with  Mem.  It  was 
unthinkable  that  Elwood  should  join  that  crowded  ark. 

For  Elwood  to  leave  his  family  and  take  a  new  house 
with  Mem  would  mean  that  he  must  abandon  his  mother 
and  the  other  children  to  the  mercy  of  Fall-down  Farnaby's 
brutality  and  indifference.  That  was,  to  a  dutiful  youth 
like  Elwood,  unthinkable. 

So  many  things  were  unthinkable  with  these  young  souls! 
But  Nature  does  not  think!  Nature  wants.  Nature  strives 
to  get,  and  getting,  devours — or  not  getting,  starves  or 
shifts  her  approach. 

Mem  might  have  figured  out  numberless  ways  of  arranging 
a  marriage  with  Elwood  if  she  had  been  more  intelligent 
or  less  confused.  But  she  was  not  brilliant  of  mind,  and  she 
was  subjected  utterly  to  the  coercion  of  discipline. 

She  was  like  a  flower  grown  in  a  pot  on  a  shelf.  Lacking 
strength  to  break  it  and  go  free,  she  would  stay  small  and 
pretty  and  obscure.  If  something  happened  to  break  the 
pot  and  fling  her  out  on  the  open  soil,  she  would  make  a 
desperate  effort  for  life,  and  if  the  soil  were  fertile  she  might 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  17 

grow  to  amazing  heights  and  beauties;  if  the  soil  were  sterile, 
she  would  simply  die.  But  she  had  nothing  within  her  to 
fling  her  off  the  shelf. 

So  when  Doctor  Bretherick  proposed  marriage  he  proposed 
something  unthinkable  at  present,  and,  now  that  Elwood's 
job  was  gone,  unthinkable  as  far  forward  as  the  girl's  easily 
baffled  mind  could  think. 

Doctor  Bretherick,  who  knew  so  much  about  Calverly 
people,  did  not  happen  to  know  that  Mem  and  Elwood  had 
been  meeting  secretly.  So  he  did  not  take  young  Farnaby 
into  consideration.  He  was  a  little  surprised  when  Mem 
refused  to  tell  him  the  name  of  the  man.  He  admired  her 
wretchedly  when  he  saw  her  trying  to  protect  the  fellow 
even  from  reproof. 

"  He's  no  more  to  blame  than  I  am,  and  I  have  no  right  to 
ruin  his  life." 

When  Doctor  Bretherick  called  the  man  a  scoundrel  she 
grew  fierce  in  his  defense. 

Doctor  Bretherick  wasted  no  time  on  the  expression  of 
virtuous  horror.  He  was  an  almost  total  abstainer  from  the 
vice  of  blame.  When  he  found  people  sick  or  delirious  or 
going  insane,  he  did  not  revile  them  for  recklessness  in 
catching  cold  or  catching  fever  or  taking  in  devils  for  tenants. 
He  tried  to  restore  them  to  comfort  and  the  practice  of  life. 
Love  was  endemic,  and  good  fortune  was  more  frequent 
than  good  conduct.  He  felt  no  call  to  insult  the  victims  of 
bad  luck  in  love.  His  answer  to  Mem's  greed  for  all  the 
blame  and  all  the  punishment  was  a  gentle  reminder: 

"It's  not  a  question,  my  child,  of  your  rights  or  his.  It's 
a  question  of  the  rights  of  a  certain  future  citizen.'* 

Mem  wept  and  beat  her  clenched  hands  upon  her  brow 
and  on  the  doctor's  desk.  He  let  her  fight  it  out,  finding  no 
consolation  fit  to  offer.  He  studied  her  as  he  had  studied 
many  another  wretch  tossing  on  a  bed  of  coals  and  crazed 
with  pains  of  body  and  mind.  He  saw  how  beautiful  she 
was,  how  thrilling  and  how  thrilled  with  that  fire  which  builds 
homes  and  burns  them  up,  kindles  romance  and  devastation. 

He  felt  a  little  sympathy  even  for  the  unknown  man,  and 
imagined  how  helpless  the  wretch  might  have  been  to  resist 


i8  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

that  incandescence  in  which  Mem  was  as  helpless  as  he, 
since  the  flame  cannot  become  ice  by  any  power  of  its  own. 

The  doctor  reached  out  and  clenched  hands  with  Mem 
in  the  fiercer  throes  of  her  regret,  or  laid  a  fatherly  caress  on 
her  bowed  head. 

"He  must  have  told  you  he  loved  you,"  he  said. 

"But  he  does  love  me,  and  I  love  him." 

"Then  why  is  he  unwilling  to  marry  you?" 

"He's  not!  There's  nothing  on  earth  he  wants  more  than 
that.  But  he  can't,  he  can't!" 

"Is  he — is  he  married  to  some  one  else?" 

Mem's  lifted  face  was  like  a  mask  of  horror,  dripping  with 
tears  but  aghast  at  such  infamy.  In  every  depth  of  shame 
there  is  a  lower  pit  from  which  the  soul  recoils  and  finds  a 
saving  pride  in  its  own  superior  height. 

The  doctor  fell  back  before  such  insulted  innocence.  He 
sought  a  hasty  shield  behind  another  question. 

"Then  what  other  obstacle  can  there  be?  This  is  a  free 
country.  You  don't  have  to  ask  anybody's  permission?" 

Mem  was  so  distraught  that  she  gave  the  one  true  reason, 
sobbing  in  the  gable  of  her  arms. 

"The  Kalkulator  factory  closes  next  week  and  his  posi 
tion  will  be  gone." 

"Young  Farnaby,  eh?"  the  doctor  mused. 

Mem  lifted  her  head  again,  and  her  hands  twitched  as  if 
to  recapture  the  secret  she  had  let  slip.  But  it  was  too  late; 
she  had  not  even  protected  Elwood  from  exposure. 

The  doctor  thought  busily.  The  word  Farnaby  pre 
sented  the  complete  picture  of  the  family  whose  woes  and 
poverty  he  had  long  known.  He  felt  encouraged  after  a 
first  discouragement. 

"Elwood's  a  nice  boy,"  he  said.  "He'll  do  what's  right. 
I'll  call  him  up  right  away.  Duty  is  more  than  skin  deep 
with  him." 

Even  as  he  took  up  the  prehensile  telephone,  Mem  snatched 
it  from  his  hand. 

"He  wants  to  do  what's  right,  but  his  first  duty  is  to  his 
mother.  He's  supporting  his  whole  family.  They'll  starve 
without  his  help.  And  what  he's  going  to  do  when  the  fac- 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  19 

tory  closes  I  don't  know.  He  can't  marry  me.  And  I  won't 
marry  him  and  drag  him  down." 

"There's  no  dragging  him  down.  You'll  make  a  wonder 
ful  wife  and  anybody  ought  to  be  proud  to  have  you.  You'll 
be  a  great  help  in  his  career." 

"But  how  can  we  live  together?"  she  cried,  frantically. 

"Don't.  The  main  thing's  the  ceremony.  Just  you  step 
out  and  get  married.  People  will  say  you're  a  couple  of 
young  fools.  But  that's  all  they  will  say,  and  they'll  enjoy 
a  bit  of  romance  in  this  dead  burg." 

He  evaded  Mem's  pleading  hands  and  called  the  factory. 

Mem's  embarrassment  was  overwhelming  before  the 
prospect  of  meeting  in  the  presence  of  a  witness  the  fellow- 
victim  of  the  tidal  wave  that  had  engulfed  them  both  one 
Sabbath  evening. 

A  fervor  of  religious  zeal  and  music  had  exalted  their 
emotions  then  and  made  their  hearts  easy  prey  to  the  moon 
light  that  waylaid  them  as  she  slipped  out  to  meet  him 
after  her  father  and  mother  had  kissed  her  good  night. 

A  wheedling,  cooing  breeze  had  stolen  through  the  vine- 
wreathed  grotto  of  the  porch,  and  had  whispered  incanta 
tions  over  them.  Their  remorse  had  been  fearful,  but  its 
very  frenzy  was  a  kind  of  madness  that  prepared  their 
dizzied  souls  for  further  need  of  it.  For  remorse,  like  other 
bitter  drugs,  establishes  a  habit. 

Mem  writhed  in  a  delirium  of  remorse  now.  Such  poetry 
in  the  proem,  such  hideous  prose  in  the  epilogue!  Such 
honey,  then  such  poison! 

She  was  wakened  from  her  fierce  reverie,  however,  by 
the  doctor's  voice: 

"El wood's  out;  he's  gone  to  the  bank  for  the  firm.  I 
left  word  for  him  to  call  me  as  soon  as  he  comes  in.  I've 
been  thinking  up  a  little  plan." 

Like  many  another  earnest  soul,  Doctor  Bretherick  was 
addicted  to  plotty  stories.  When  he  had  wrestled  in  vain 
with  some  wolf  of  disease  for  some  agonizing  patient  he 
would  forsake  the  never-ending  mystery  serial  of  pain  and 
death  and  take  up  some  volume  of  so-called  "trash." 

Like  nearly  everybody  else  in  the  country,  Doctor  Breth- 


20  SOULS    FOR   SALE 

erick  had  tried  his  hand  at  the  newest  indoor  sport,  the 
writing  of  stories  for  moving  pictures — a  popular  vice  that 
had  largely  replaced  the  older  custom  of  writing  plays.  So 
now  he  improvised  for  Mem's  future  what  a  moving-picture 
man  would  call  a  "continuity." 

"This  afternoon,  after  the  factory  closes,  you  and  Elwood 
can  meet  and  drive  over  to  Mosby.  I  know  the  town  clerk 
over  there — he  owes  me  a  bill.  I'll  telephone  him  to  make 
out  the  licenses  and  have  'em  all  ready  for  you  when  you 
get  there.  He  can  marry  you  or  get  a  judge  to,  or  a  parson. 
You'd  prefer  a  preacher,  I  suppose.  Well,  I  can  arrange 
that,  too.  I'll  vouch  for  you  both,  and  he'll  say  the  neces 
sary  words  and  give  you  a  nice  certificate,  and  then  you 
can  telephone  your  father  from  Mosby  and  ask  for  his 
blessing.  He  won't  give  it  over  the  telephone,  but  he  will 
the  next  day  when  you  two  will  drive  back  like  a  couple  of 
prodigals.  Your  father  will  see  you  coming  from  afar,  and 
he'll  run  out  and  fall  on  your  necks. 

"You  can  ask  forgiveness,  and  then  you  can  explain 
about  Elwood's  job  and  how  you'll  have  to  live  at  home  till 
he  gets  another.  Heaven  knows  you  earn  your  board  and 
keep  at  home,  and  they'll  be  mighty  glad  to  have  you  there. 
By  and  by  Elwood  will  find  a  new  job,  and  you'll  get  rich 
and  live  happily  ever  after — " 

Mem  was  almost  smiling  at  the  shabby  heaven  he  threw 
on  the  screen  of  her  imagination.  It  was  so  much  better 
than  anything  she  had  hoped.  Then  her  old  enemy,  the 
arch-realist,  the  sneering  censor,  Poverty,  slashed  at  the 
dream. 

"I  don't  believe  Elwood  could  afford  the  money.  He'd 
have  to  pay  the  livery  stable  for  the  horse  and  buggy,  and 
there's  the  license  fee,  and  the  ring,  and  the  preacher,  and 
the — the  hotel,  and —  Oh,  I  don't  believe  we  could  afford  it." 

"I'll  lend  you  all  that,"  the  doctor  insisted.  "I'm  one  of 
those  authors  that  has  enough  confidence  in  his  story  to 
back  it  himself.  You  go  ahead  and  get  happiness  and  quit 
grieving.  And  don't  you  dare  to  change  my  manuscript. 
I'm  one  of  those  pernickety  authors  that  believe  actresses 
should  act  and  let  the  authors  auth." 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  21 

Mem  was  laughing  through  her  tears  when  the  telephone 
rang. 

The  doctor's  welcoming  "Hello!"  broke  through  a  many- 
wrinkled  smile.  It  froze  to  a  grimace.  As  Mem  watched, 
hearing  only  a  rattling,  inarticulate  noise  as  from  a  manikin 
inside  the  telephone,  the  doctor's  pleated  skin  was  slowly 
drawn  into  new  folds  until  his  face,  from  being  a  cartoon  of 
old  hilarity,  became  a  withered  mummy  of  dejection.  He 
kept  saying:  "Yes.  .  .  .  Yes.  .  .  .  Yes!"  and  finally,  "That's 
right — bring  him  here." 

He  set  down  the  telephone  as  if  it  were  a  drained  cup  of 
hemlock. 

"It  wasn't  Elwood,"  Mem  said. 

"No.    Yes.    Well—    O  God !  what  a  bitter  world  this  is !" 

Mem  caught  eagerly  at  grief. 

"Tell  me!  What's  happened?  What's  happened  to 
Elwood?  He's  hurt.  He's  killed." 

And  since  she  had  seized  the  knife  from  his  reluctant  hand 
and  driven  it  into  her  heart,  he  left  it  there  and  said: 

"Yes." 


CHAPTER  IV 

THE  doctor  had  not  told  the  exact  truth.  For  once  his 
lie  was  worse  than  the  truth. 

Young  Farnaby  was  not  dead — not  yet.  But  from  what 
he  had  been  told  the  doctor  was  sure  that  death  was  decreed. 
As  his  mind,  so  habited  to  fatal  news,  struggled  with  this 
message,  it  seemed  better  to  leave  Mem  in  her  despair  than 
to  raise  her  to  a  brief  suspense. 

He  would  make  a  fight  for  the  young  man's  life,  as  always; 
he  never  gave  up  while  there  was  any  life  to  fight  for.  Then 
if  by  some  strange  good  fortune  he  should  redeem  this 
youth  from  the  grave,  it  would  be  a  glorious  privilege  to 
restore  him  to  his  sweetheart.  But  if  he  should  keep  her 
hope  alive,  then  lose  the  war,  he  must  kill  her  twice. 

It  seemed  as  if  he  had  struck  her  dead  already.  For  her 
clenched  hands  let  each  other  go,  her  arms  fell  outward  like 
the  wings  of  a  shot  bird,  her  head  fell  on  her  breast,  and  she 
was  slipping  to  the  floor  when  he  caught  her. 

For  the  mercy  of  this  swoon  he  was  as  nearly  thankful  as 
he  could  be  for  anything.  He  got  her  up  in  his  arms,  carried 
her  to  the  door,  opened  it  with  much  fumbling,  and  staggered 
up  the  stairs  with  her  to  the  spare  room,  calling  to  his  wife : 

"Get  her  undressed  and  keep  her  in  bed  till  I  come  back. 
Don't  let  her  talk.  Don't  mind  what  she  says.  But  keep 
her  here  till  I  tell  you." 

Then  he  hurried  downstairs  to  meet  the  crowd  running 
to  his  gate  in  pursuit  of  an  automobile.  He  recognized  it  as 
the  Seipp  car.  Its  fenders  were  crumpled  and  stained,  and 
men  got  out  of  it,  removed  with  much  trouble  a  long  limp 
body,  and  moved  up  the  walk. 

When,  a  little  later,  Mem  came  suddenly  back  to  the 
world,  she  found  Mrs.  Bretherick  bending  over  her.  She 
felt  blankets  about  her  and  a  pillow  under  her  head.  Her 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  23 

shoes  and  stockings,  her  hat  and  her  dress,  were  gone,  and 
she  was  in  a  strange  room. 

Getting  accustomed  to  wallpaper  and  chairs  and  chromos 
was  the  first  business,  before  her  soul  could  begin  to  orient 
itself.  Then  she  recalled  everything  and  began  to  cry  out: 

' '  Elwood !    Tell  me  about  Elwood ! ' ' 

"Hush,  my  dear!"  was  all  Mrs.  Bretherick  would  say. 
She  said  it  very  gently,  but  when  Mem  tried  to  leap  from  the 
bed  the  old  woman  was  very  strong  and  held  her  down, 
coercing  her  with  iron  hands  and  a  maddening  reiteration  of: 
"Hush!  Don't  excite  yourself.  The  doctor  says  you  must 
stay  here.  Hush  now,  my  dear." 

Mem's  rebellion  was  checked  by  the  sound  of  a  loud  nasal 
voice  coming  up  from  below.  Some  one  downstairs  was 
explaining  something. 

"You  see,  it  was  thisaway,  Doc.  I  was  standin'  in  front 
of  Parlin's  candy  store  right  next  the  bank  there,  when  I 
heard  some  fellers  laughin'.  Somebody  hollered:  'Climb  a 
lamp-post,  ever'body.  Here  comes  Molly  Seipp!'  And  I 
seen  the  big  Seipp  car  comin'  scootin'  along.  Molly  said 
afterward  she  allowed  to  shift  from  second  speed  to  neutarl 
and  put  on  the  foot  brake.  But  she  got  rattled  by  the 
crowd  round  the  bank,  and  slipped  into  high  and  stepped  on 
the  gas,  and  the  car  come  boomin'  over  the  sidewalk  and 
mowed  right  into  the  crowd.  People  jumped  every  which 
way,  and  one  or  two  got  knocked  down,  but  poor  Elwood 
here,  he  was  just  comin'  out  the  bank,  and  Molly  was 
twistin'  the  steerin'  wheel  so  crazy  he  didn't  know  which 
side  to  jump.  And  the  car  knocked  him  right  through  the 
big  plate-glass  window,  you  know,  and  up  against  the  steel 
bars  just  inside  and — well,  the  bars  was  all  bent,  at  that. 
Poor  Elwood  hadn't  a  chance. 

"  Molly  climbed  out  the  car  and  fell  over  on  the  sidewalk, 
leavin'  the  wheels  still  goin'  round.  I  stepped  on  the  runnin' 
board  and  shut  off  the  engine.  Then  I  and  some  other  fellers 
backed  the  car  out,  and  whilst  the  others  picked  up  Elwood 
and  Molly,  I  seen  the  motor  was  still  goin'  good. 

"So  we  put  Elwood  in  the  car  and  we  brought  him  over 
to  you.  Molly's  all  right  except  for  hysterics,  like,  but 


24  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

Elwood —  Is  they  any  hope  for  him?  Nice  boy,  too — hard 
workin',  honest  as  the  day.  He  had  two  bank  books  in  his 
hand — one  of  'em  the  firm's,  the  other'n  was  his  own  little 
savin's  account.  He  always  managed  to  save  somethin'  out 
of  nothin'.  He  helt  on  to  the  book,  Jim  says,  till  he  could 
hardly  git  it  out  of  his  hand.  And  it's  all  cut  up  with  glass 
and  covered  with  red  so'st  you  couldn't  hardly  tell  how 
much  he  had  in  the  bank.  Nice  boy,  too.  He  made  a  hard 
fight  to  live.  Didn't  holler  at  tall — just  kept  grittin'  his 
teeth  and  mumblin'  somethin'.  You  couldn't  make  out 
what  he  said.  Could  you,  Jim?" 

Jim's  answer  was  not  audible. 

Nor  were  Mem's  protests  audible. 

She  had  been  bred  to  expect  little  of  life,  to  make  no 
demands  for  luxury,  and  to  surrender  with  a  cheerful  Thy- 
will-be-done  what  the  Lord  took  away  with  perfect  right, 
since  He  had  given  it.  So  now  she  made  no  fight,  no  outcry. 
She  lay  still,  her  head  throbbing  with  the  words  of  Laurence 
Hope  in  a  song  one  of  her  girl  friends  sang: 

Less  than  the  dust  beneath  thy  chariot  wheel, 
Less  than  the  rust  that  stains  thy  glorious  sword — 
Less  than  the  dust,  less  than  the  dust  am  I. 

It  was  the  doctor  who  made  the  fight  silently  but  bitterly, 
fiercely  and  in  vain. 

The  only  noise  was  made  by  the  Farnaby  family  when 
they  arrived  in  a  little  mob.  They  came  up  the  street,  Mrs. 
Farnaby  from  her  tub,  her  forearms  covered  with  dried 
suds,  her  red  hands  snatching  her  apron  hem  to  and  fro. 
She  and  the  girls  wailed  aloud,  and  in  the  room  below  Mem 
could  hear  the  young  brothers  crying.  But  none  of  them 
wept  so  bitterly  or  so  loudly  as  old  Fall-down  Farnaby, 
who  came  staggering  up  the  steps  and  floundered  about  the 
room,  freed  by  drunkenness  of  all  restraints  upon  his  remorse 
and  his  fear.  And  nobody  had  better  reason  to  reproach 
his  lot  than  the  poor  old  prey  of  the  thirst  fiends,  doomed  to 
roll  up  the  hill  of  remorse  in  his  own  hell  a  heavy  stone  of 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  25 

repentance  that  always  broke  loose  at  the  top  and  rolled 
down  again,  dragging  him  with  it. 

Mem  was  benumbed  with  her  sorrow.  It  was  a  proper 
punishment  upon  her,  she  was  sure ;  and  she  spread  her  arms 
out  as  on  a  crucifix,  thinking  of  herself  as  one  of  the  thieves 
justly  nailed  to  the  tree  next  to  that  tree  where  the  Innocent 
One  suffered. 

Doctor  Bretherick  had  paused  in  his  desperate  battle  to 
listen  for  sounds  from  the  room  above.  He  had  gone  to 
the  stairs  to  ask  his  wife  how  Mem  was.  He  had  been  glad 
of  the  prostration  of  her  grief,  but  he  was  not  deceived  as  to 
its  sincerity. 

Mem  was  still  calm  when  his  business  was  done  in  the 
room  below  and  he  had  turned  the  spoils  of  defeat  over  to 
his  aide-de-camp,  the  undertaker.  Doctor  Bretherick  entered 
the  bedroom  and  sent  his  wife  about  her  business  while  he 
dropped  his  exhausted  body  into  a  chair  and  spurred  his 
exhausted  mind  to  further  effort. 

He  took  one  of  Mem's  cold  hands  in  his  and  petted  it  and 
chafed  it,  shaking  his  head  in  wordless  sympathy. 

"At  least  he  didn't  suffer!"  he  lied. 

Her  woe,  for  lack  of  other  expression,  made  use  of  the 
smiling  muscles,  as  she  said: 

"That's  not  true.    I  heard." 

"Well,"  the  doctor  sighed,  "his  sufferings  are  over,  any 
way.  He  was  a  good  boy,  and  you're  a  good,  brave  girl. 
And  now  what  are  we  to  do  for  you? " 

She  spoke  without  excitement. 

"There's  only  one  thing  for  me.  I  can't  live,  of  course. 
I  was  sorry  I  was  so  sick,  and  I  was  afraid  of  my  cough ;  but 
now  I  see  that  God  sent  it  to  me  as  a  blessing.  Do  you 
think  it  will  carry  me  off  soon?" 

The  doctor  shook  his  head.  This  frightened  her.  She 
gasped: 

"Then  it  must  be — I  must  do  it  myself.  It's  wicked,  I 
suppose,  but —  Have  you  got  anything  that  isn't  too  slow 
or  disfiguring?  I  don't  mind  the  pain,  but  I  don't  want  to 
go  to  hell  with  an  ugly  face." 

The  doctor  was  so  familiar  with  deaths  that  he  was  capable 
3 


26  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

of  an  occasional  irony  that  looked  like  flippancy  to  those 
who  met  them  only  rarely.  He  was  bitterer  than  Mem 
could  imagine  when  he  sighed: 

"No,  that's  right.  It's  the  pretty  faces  that  go  to  hell, 
according  to  my  understanding  of  it.  Heaven  is  for  the 
homely  and  the  unattractive.  Poor  things,  they  need  some 
consolation." 

"Don't  joke,  for  mercy's  sake,  Doctor!"  she  pleaded. 
"I  couldn't  live  without  Elwood,  I  don't  dare  to.  I've  no 
right  to." 

He  cowed  her  hysteria  with  a  sharp  rein : 

"You've  no  right  to  your  own  life  now.  It  belongs  to 
your  father  and  your  mother — and  to  the  life  that  has  already 
begun.  Suicide  would  be  worse  than  cowardice  and  selfish 
ness  in  your  case,  my  child.  It  would  be  murder." 

He  was  cruelly  kind  to  her,  like  a  driver  who  flogs  and 
stabs  a  sinking  beast  of  burden  out  of  the  deep  mire  of  death 
and  up  across  the  steep  crags  to  the  valley  beyond. 

Mem's  very  skin  shivered  and  seemed  to  rise  in  welts 
under  his  goad.  Her  heart  struggled  back  to  its  task. 
Fiercely  as  it  ached,  it  beat  with  a  fuller  throb.  Her  soul 
brooded  somberly,  though: 

"Well,  if  it's  my  duty  to  live,  it's  my  duty  to  tell  the 
truth.  I'll  tell  it  to  everybody.  Poor  Elwood  sha'n't 
go  into  his  grave  without  people  knowing  how  I  loved 
him." 

He  let  her  frenzy  of  devotion  carry  her  up  and  down  the 
room  until  she  dropped  into  a  chair,  exhausted. 

Then  he  took  up  the  whip  again. 

"My  poor  little  child,  I've  got  to  be  terrible  mean  to  you 
for  your  own  sake.  You  can't  do  what  you  want  to  do. 
You  said  yourself  that  it  would  kill  your  father  if  he  knew; 
it  would  drive  him  from  his  pulpit.  And  your  mother 
would  be  crushed  too,  you  said.  And  as  for  poor  Elwood — 
wouldn't  it  simply  turn  the  village  against  his  memory? 
Everybody  thinks  of  him  as  a  brave,  clean  young  martyr — 
as  he  was.  But  just  imagine  what  would  happen  if  they 
learned  what  we  know. 

"No,  honey,  you've  got  to  fight  it  out  alone.    It's  pitiful, 


SOULS    FOR   SALE  27 

but  you're  going  to  be  glad  some  day  when  you  look  back 
on  it  from  happiness — " 

"Happiness!"  she  groaned.  The  word  was  loathsome, 
despicable.  The  possibility  of  it  belittled  her  grief. 

The  doctor  withdrew  it.  "I  don't  mean  happiness,  but 
some  big,  high  peak  of  goodness.  Your  life  is  going  to  be 
lifted  up  because  of  this,  if  you'll  only  meet  it  as  you  must." 

"Tell  me  what  to  do.  Don't  make  me  think.  I've  got 
too  much  to  think — about  what's  dead  and  gone." 

Then  she  sobbed  and  sobbed  till  her  eyes  were  drained 
again  of  tears. 

The  doctor  was  as  weary  as  she — wearier,  for  he  had  her 
burden  to  carry  as  well  as  his  own. 

He  sought  a  little  respite,  not  for  relief,  but  for  clear 
thinking.  It  was  hard  to  think  when  a  broken  heart  bled 
and  leaped  before  his  eyes. 

"What  you  are  to  do  is  this:  While  I  try  to  figure  out  the 
best  plan  for  the  future,  you  go  along  on  home  and  tell  your 
father  and  mother  that  you  were  here  when  Elwood  was 
brought  here.  No,  just  go  home  with  me  and  I'll  tell  them. 
I'll  tell  them  the  shock  has  prostrated  you  and  that  you 
mustn't  be  spoken  to  about  it.  You  must  be  kept  quiet, 
and  when  you  cry  you  mustn't  be  questioned,  just  let  alone." 

"Can't  mamma  hold  me  in  her  arms ? "  the  girl  whimpered. 

"Yes,  and  you  can  tell  her  the  whole  story  if  you  want  to." 

"No,  no!  I  can't!  I  won't!  But  I  must  have  her  arms 
around  me.  I  must  have  arms  around  me  to  hold  my  heart 
together." 


CHAPTER  V 

doctor  helped  the  little  widowed  mourner  into  his 
old  buggy,  and  she  kept  her  face  uplifted,  clear  of  tears, 
through  the  streets  and  along  the  walk  at  home. 

She  broke  only  when  she  heard  the  doctor's  voice  telling 
what  the  father  and  mother  who  received  them  on  the  porch 
of  their  little  house  had  already  heard  from  a  passing  gossip. 
They  stared  amazed  when  Mem  darted  up  the  stairs  without 
speaking,  and  they  heard  her  crying  in  her  room. 

The  doctor  checked  their  pursuit  and  gave  them  his  orders 
as  if  they  were  unruly  children.  When  he  had  gone  the 
mother  stole  up  to  Mem's  bedside  and  gathered  her  baby  to 
her  breast.  It  would  have  been  almost  sweet  to  weep  there 
if  only  the  truth  could  have  been  voiced. 

By  and  by  the  old  clergyman  crept  up  the  stairs  and  into 
the  room  and  gave  his  clumsy  sympathy.  But  when  he 
spoke  of  God's  will  and  of  the  all-wise,  all-loving  Providence 
Mem  had  to  bite  her  tongue  to  keep  it  from  blasphemy, 
from  the  savage  delight  of  confounding  the  preacher  with 
truths  he  could  never  have  suspected.  He  even  went  so  far 
as  to  plead  that  he  had  done  wisely  in  keeping  Mem  from 
seeing  Elwood  oftener;  otherwise  she  might  have  wanted 
to  marry  him. 

This  threw  the  girl  into  hysterics.  She  laughed  so  fiend 
ishly  that  her  mother  drove  her  father  from  the  room,  and 
finally  slipped  away  herself,  knowing  that  solitude  is  the 
best  medicine  for  that  brief  madness. 

Alone  with  her  soul,  Mem  grew  afraid  of  herself.  She 
knew  that  she  could  not  keep  the  truth  choked  back  in  her 
rebellious  heart  forever. 

All  night  long  she  coughed  and  wept,  and,  fearing  that 
the  household  kept  anxious  vigil,  felt  one  more  remorse 
added  to  her  pack. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  29 

Next  morning  her  father  and  her  mother  besought  the 
doctor  to  come  to  see  her.  But  he  answered: 

"Send  her  tome." 

When  they  told  her  she  realized  that  he  was  afraid  to 
talk  to  her  in  her  own  home,  and  she  found  strength  enough 
to  rise  from  her  bed  and  go  to  him. 

When  Mem  paused  in  his  door  until  an  onset  of  crying 
had  passed,  he  almost  smiled.  She  looked  at  him  like  a 
doomed  animal  and  murmured  as  she  dropped  into  a  chair: 

"Don't  you  suppose  this  cough  will  solve  my  problem 
and  put  an  end  to  me  before — before — " 

He  shook  his  head  as  he  closed  the  door  and  went  to  his 
desk  chair:  "Your  cough  will  take  a  long  time  to  cure  or 
kill.  But  it  may  come  in  very  handy.  I've  got  it  all  thought 
out.  You  can't  stay  in  this  town  now,  I  suppose.  Most  of 
the  animals  crawl  away  and  hide  at  such  a  time;  so  suppose 
you  just  vanish.  Let  your  cough  carry  you  off  to — say, 
Arizona  or  California." 

She  was  startled  at  this  undreamed-of  escape.    He  went  on  : 

"I'll  tell  the  necessary  lies.  That's  a  large  part  of  my 
practice.  And  practice  makes  perfect.  You  will  go  to  some 
strange  town — and  pose  as  a  widow. 

"You  will  marry  an  imaginary  man  out  there  and  let  him 
die  quietly.  Then,  if  you  ever  want  to  come  home  here, 
you  can  come  back  as  Mrs.  Somebody-or-other. " 

This  reminded  her  again  that  she  had  others  to  think  of 
besides  herself.  Her  dazed  soul,  still  trying  to  creep  round 
the  deep  well  of  death,  busied  itself  with  the  fantastic  make- 
believe  of  the  doctor.  But  she  protested: 

"How  could  I  go  any  place  and  pretend  to  be  a  widow 
when  papa  and  mamma  would  send  all  their  letters  to  me  as 
Miss  Steddon?" 

The  doctor  was  ready  for  her.  He  would  order  Mem  to  be 
sent  to  the  Far  West  immediately  and  to  live  meagerly  in 
the  desert  somewhere,  because  her  father  was  poor,  being  a 
parson,  and  had  loved  her  too  unwisely  well  to  teach  her  a 
trade. 

Once  she  was  safely  started,  Mem  was  to  write  home  that 
she  had  met  on  the  train  some  old  flame  of  earlier  years  and — 


30  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

Here  his  hostile  audience  interrupted  him.  Life  was  slow 
in  Calverly,  and  Mem  could  hardly  imagine  such  a  swift 
succession  of  events  as  Doctor  Bretherick  was  so  glibly 
planning  for  her.  At  any  other  time,  to  hear  of  going  to 
California,  or  anywhere,  would  have  been  an  epochal  adven 
ture.  But  Paradise  was  no  longer  within  her  rights.  She 
had  earned  Sheol  or  some  dire  penance  so  well  that  it  was 
lidiculous  to  propose  romance,  and  romance  in  the  Eden  of 
palm  trees  and  orange  flowers.  She  revolted,  too,  from  the 
pretense  of  having  had  another  lover  before  Elwood: 

"But  I  never  had  any  'flames' — " 

The  author  was  impatient  at  finding  Pegasus  held  down 
to  this  tame  hitching  post  of  a  life.  He  said: 

"You've  been  away  somewhere,  haven't  you?" 

"Not  much  nor  far,"  she  sighed.  "I  was  in  Carthage  once 
at  Aunt  Mabel's." 

"Well,  you  must  have  left  a  lot  of  broken  hearts  there." 

She  sighed  again  as  she  shook  her  head.  She  was  sadly 
glad  to  confess  that  no  broken  hearts  had  marked  her  path : 

"Aunt  Mabel  was  sick  and  I  had  to  nurse  her.  That's 
how  I  got  to  go.  The  only  men  I  met  brought  in  the  groceries 
and  the  mail." 

"But  you've  got  to  have  another  sweetheart,  honey. 
Your  folks  don't  know  that  you  never  met  anybody  in 
Carthage.  So  we'll  make  one  up." 

"But  they'd  ask  Aunt  Mabel,  and  she'd  say  there  was  no 
such  man  there." 

"Then  we'll  make  him  a  traveling  man  that  you  met. 
You  went  to  church,  didn't  you?" 

"Oh  yes!" 

"Well,  then,  one  day  he  occupied  the  pew  with  you  and 
sang  out  of  your  book  and  walked  home  with  you,  and — 
er — um — you  had  forgotten  all  about  him  until  he  recalled 
himself  to  you  on  the  train,  and  he  was  so  respectful  that 
you  couldn't  snub  him.  And  by  a  strange  coincidence  he 
was  getting  off  at  wherever  you're  going  to  get  off  at." 

Mem  was  at  her  apple-blossom  time.  She  was  frosted  a 
little  with  grief,  but  still  white  and  fragrant,  frail  and  lov 
able,  difficult  to  leave  upon  the  bough.  He  saw  the  tremor 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  31 

on  her  lips,  the  little  zephyrs  of  hopeless  amorous  yearning 
that  lifted  her  bosom,  the  soft,  lithe  fingers  that  intertwined 
with  one  another  for  lack  of  stronger  hands  to  clasp.  He  said : 

"You've  got  to  forget  yourself  and  your  sorrow  and 
your  truthfulness  for  the  sake  of  your  mother  and  father, 
because — " 

"Just  tell  me  what  to  do — not  why,  but  what.  You 
must  save  me  and  them.  I  want  to  die,  but  it  would  be  too 
easy,  too  selfish,  too  cowardly.  Give  me  something  to  live 
for  and  I'll  do  my  best.  Only  don't  argue,  don't  argue!" 

"That's  the  way  to  talk,"  he  said.  "Take  my  prescrip 
tions  as  I  give  them  to  you,  and  we'll  save  everybody  from 
destruction.  But  if  you  won't  let  me  tell  you  why,  you 
must  ask  no  questions.  I  order  you  to  go  West  and  to  find 
an  imaginary  husband  there.  His  name  shall  be — let  me 
see,  what  shall  we  call  him?  Wait  a  minute." 

He  reached  back  to  an  overcrowded  revolving  bookcase 
and  took  out  the  first  volume  his  hands  encountered.  It 
was  a  history  of  medicine,  and  he  was  fond  of  it  because  it 
was  also  a  history  of  the  vanity  of  human  science  in  its 
eternal  war  with  death  and  of  the  bitter  hostility  that 
greeted  every  benefactor. 

He  rejected  Galen,  Harvey,  Jenner,  and  came  finally 
upon  the  name  of  Doctor  Woodville,  who  went  to  the  defense 
of  Jenner  in  the  great  war  for  vaccination  and  helped  to 
make  the  hideous  ravages  of  smallpox  as  rare  now  as  they 
were  common  in  his  time.  Bretherick  liked  this  name  of 
Woodville. 

He  had  sent  patients  to  Tucson — which  he  pronounced 
"Tuckson" — and  also  to  Yuma,  which  had  a  wild  and 
romantic  sound.  At  each  of  these  towns  he  planned  that 
Mem  should  remain  a  week  or  two  in  her  own  name.  In 
her  letters  home  she  was  to  say  much  of  this  Mr.  Woodville 
and  his  devotion. 

Then,  as  Doctor  Bretherick's  excited  mental  spinnerets 
poured  out  the  web,  she  was  to  write  that  Mr.  Woodville 
was  called  farther  West  and  could  not  bear  to  leave  her, 
pleaded  with  her  so  earnestly  to  become  his  wife  and  go 
with  him,  that  her  heart  had  told  her  to  accept  him.  She 


32  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

was  to  describe  a  hasty  marriage  and  request  that  her  letters 
thereafter  be  addressed  to  her  as  "Mrs.  Woodville." 

After  a  brief  honeymoon  she  could  eliminate  Doctor 
Woodville  in  some  way  to  be  decided  at  leisure.  It  would 
be  risky,  he  said,  to  let  Mr.  Woodville  live  too  long. 

Mem  had  no  experience  of  the  dramatic  limbo;  but  she 
began  to  play  the  critic  and  point  out  the  difficulties  and  the 
spots  where  the  action  would  break  down: 

"Suppose  I  met  somebody  at  Yuma  or  Tuckson  who 
knew  me  and  wrote  home.  Suppose  some  accident  kept  me 
there.  What  if  I  fell  ill  and  couldn't  get  away?  And  money 
—if  I  married  Mr.  Woodville,  my  father  would  stop  sending 
me  any,  and  then  I'd  starve  to  death — " 

The  doctor  frowned.  His  fancy  had  carried  him  skip 
pingly  over  the  high  spots  of  the  landscape,  and  now  she 
had  tripped  him  and  cast  him  headlong.  But  he  would  not 
give  her  up.  He  pointed  out  the  attractive  features  of  his 
scheme,  the  travel,  the  new  landscapes,  the  new  faces  and 
souls,  the  glorious  adventures,  the  possibility  of  meeting  a 
real  Mr.  Woodville  who  would  replace  the  homemade 
product. 

While  he  tried  to  sell  the  merchandise  of  his  fancy,  Mem's 
own  imagination  was  riotous.  She  was  young,  starved  for 
life,  for  other  horizons.  Death  and  disgrace  were  more 
untimely  than  her  heart  realized  in  its  grief.  The  very 
perils  of  the  enterprise  made  it  a  little  interesting.  But 
chiefly  she  found  it  acceptable  because  it  was  odious  and 
difficult  and  a  sacrifice  for  others'  sakes.  And  so  at  last  she 
consented  to  play  the  part  as  best  she  could. 

Mem  rose  to  go.  She  was  in  haste  to  begin  her  career. 
But  she  gasped  and  sank  into  her  chair  with  a  deathly  dread. 
Her  first  audience  must  be  her  father  and  mother,  and  she 
was  paralyzed  with  stage  fright,  sick,  dizzy  with  confusion 
and  the  abrupt  collapse  of  memory. 

Doctor  Bretherick  put  his  arm  about  her,  lifted  her  to  his 
breast,  and  upheld  her  like  a  tower  of  strength,  quoting  the 
words  Walt  Whitman  used  to  the  wounded  soldier:  "Lean 
on  me!  By  God,  I  will  not  let  you  die." 

Mem  was  not  stirred  by  the  doctor's  promises  of  happiness 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  33 

and  life,  but  only  by  the  persuasion  that  she  would  be  really 
proving  her  love  for  her  parents  by  deceiving  them.  Doctor 
Bretherick  offered  to  take  the  brunt  of  her  first  clash  with  her 
desperate  future. 

"I'll  go  home  with  you  again  and  fix  it  all  up  with  your 
papa  and  mamma.  They'll  take  it  kind  of  hard,  likely, 
losing  you  right  away,  and  they'll  worry  over  your  health 
and  your  going  away  alone;  but  we've  got  to  do  the  best  we 
can  for  their  sweet  sakes.  If  you  stayed  here  you'd  break 
your  own  heart  and  theirs  and  die  in  the  bargain.  My  way 
saves  your  life  and  their  pride.  All  they'll  suffer  will  be 
losing  the  sight  of  you;  but  that's  part  of  the  job  of  being  a 
parent. 

"And  part  of  the  job  of  being  a  doctor  is  giving  people  a 
lot  of  pain  to  save  them  from  a  lot  more,  and  scaring  them 
for  their  own  good.  So  come  along,  honey." 

As  they  set  out  upon  the  short  ride  to  the  clergyman's 
home  the  doctor  felt  as  if  he  were  advancing  to  a  duel  with 
an  ancient  adversary.  He  did  not  believe  in  Doctor  Sted- 
don's  creeds.  They  were  cruel  legends,  in  his  opinion.  He 
pictured  preachers  as  men  who  slander  the  beauties  of  this 
world  in  order  to  glorify  a  false  heaven  of  their  own  concoc 
tion;  who  would  make  this  world  a  joyless,  barren  hell  in 
order  to  save  its  citizens  from  an  imaginary  nightmare  of 
ancient  ignorance ;  who  minimize  the  hideous  cruelties  of 
this  life  and  salve  its  agonies  with  words.  He  could  not 
understand  or  love  the  God  they  preached.  He  did  not 
believe  their  God  to  be  the  true  God.  His  heart  was  full 
of  love  and  of  aspiration  and  of  mystic  bafflements  and 
longings,  but  he  was  utterly  convinced  that  whatever  God 
might  be,  He  was  not  this  man-made  God  who  inspired 
Doctor  Steddon  with  such  hatred  of  His  world  and  its  ways. 

He  advanced  to  the  contest,  therefore,  with  a  lust  of  con 
flict.  He  felt  himself  a  kind  of  Sir  Gawain  with  a  lady  on  the 
pillion,  riding  into  a  dark  forest  to  conquer  the  giant  ogre 
who  denied  her  her  realm. 

But  when  he  reached  the  castle  he  found  it  a  humble  cot 
tage;  the  ogre  was  an  undernourished  old  parson  afraid  of 
this  world  and  the  next,  but  most  afraid  of  his  beloved 


34  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

daughter's  health.  And  at  the  ogre's  side  on  the  drawbridge 
the  ogress  was  a  frightened  mother  wringing  wrinkled  hands 
with  terror. 

Seeing  Mem  returning  with  the  doctor,  they  had  come  out 
on  the  porch  in  trembling  anxiety.  They  were  already  so 
abased  of  hope,  that  when  the  doctor  told  them  that  Mem 
would  be  all  right  if  she  could  get  away  to  California  right 
away,  they  felt  as  if  he  had  lifted  them  from  the  dust.  He 
was  not  so  much  taking  their  ewe  lamb  from  them  as  saving 
her  to  them. 

They  were  fawningly  grateful  to  him,  zealous  for  any 
sacrifice  to  benefit  their  child.  The  doctor  despised  himself 
for  a  contemptible  slanderer  because  of  the  mere  thoughts 
that  had  passed  through  his  mind  on  his  way  to  the  duel. 

As  for  Mem,  she  was  crucified  with  remorse.  If  her 
parents  had  only  been  harsh  with  her  or  stingy  with  the 
money  she  would  require,  if  they  had  only  mentioned  the 
difficulties  or  celebrated  their  sacrifice  as  a  duty,  she  could 
have  found  some  straw  to  cling  to  as  she  drowned  in  self- 
contempt.  But  their  terror  and  their  tenderness  were  all 
for  her,  and  her  love  for  them  gushed  like  hot  blood  until  it 
seemed  an  inconceivable  treachery  to  conceal  from  them  the 
truth. 

It  was  well  that  Doctor  Bretherick  came  with  her  and 
stood  by  to  check  her  outcry,  for  her  heart  was  fairly  bursting 
with  the  centrifugal  explosive  power  of  a  compressed  secret. 

Doctor  Bretherick  kept  her  under  the  ward  of  his  stern 
eyes  until  he  had  frightened  the  parents  just  enough  and 
reassured  them  just  enough  to  make  sure  that  they  would 
let  Mem  go,  and  go  alone. 

He  gained  a  little  acrid  stimulant  from  Doctor  Steddon's 
dread  of  seeing  his  innocent  daughter  leave  the  shelter  of 
her  home  and  go  out  into  the  dangerous  world.  The  doctor 
knew  too  well  from  a  doctor's  long  experience  how  far  the 
beautiful  ideal  of  the  home  is  from  the  actual  usual  house 
hold.  He  knew  too  well  that  many  a  home  keeps  in  more 
dreadful  evils  than  it  keeps  out.  But  he  could  not  say  these 
things.  He  had  a  home  of  his  own  and  a  family  of  his  own, 
and  he  revered  the  dream  and  the  ideal. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  35 

And  so  the  continuity  began  to  move.  At  first  it  followed 
the  doctor's  manuscript  with  remarkable  smoothness.  Then 
Life,  the  ruthless  Philistine  manager,  took  a  hand  in  it  and 
twisted  and  turned  it  until  its  author  would  never  have 
recognized  it. 

It  carried  the  frightened  waif  of  village  disaster  to  cosmic 
heights  unimaginable,  to  unheard-of  experiences  wherein 
this  familiar  experience  of  hers  served  as  a  schooling  and  an 
inspiration.  Her  degradation  became  her  salvation;  her 
practice  of  lies  taught  her  eternal  truths. 

Her  father,  when  he  learned  of  this,  wished  that  she  had 
died  in  her  cradle.  But  millions  of  people  blessed  her  where 
she  walked  and  smiled. 

And  by  a  miracle  unequaled  in  the  chronicle  of  any  pre 
vious  generation  she  walked  and  smiled  and  carried  balm 
and  spikenard  all  about  the  world  without  wings,  yet  with 
unwearying  feet.  She  appeared  in  a  hundred  places  at  once 
by  a  diabolic  telepathy  in  a  multiplication  that  made  of  one 
shy,  frightened  girl  a  shining  multitude.  And  at  times  each 
of  her  was  of  an  elfin  tininess,  at  times  of  titanic  size.  But 
all  of  her  was  always  of  more  than  human  sympathy,  and 
spoke  a  language  that  men  of  every  nation  understood. 


CHAPTER  VI 

r~pHAT  clergyman's  home  was  really  a  theater.  If  there 
1  had  been  a  camera  man  to  follow  the  various  members 
about,  it  would  have  been  what  the  moving-picture  people 
call  a  "location." 

The  Reverend  Doctor  Steddon  abhorred  theaters  or 
moving  pictures  and  all  forms  of  dramatic  fiction  (except 
his  own  sermons) ,  yet  everybody  in  the  house  was  playing  a 
part — with  benevolent  purposes,  of  course.  But  then,  benev 
olence  is  one  of  the  motives  of  nearly  all  acting — to  divert 
some  one  from  his  own  distresses  by  exploiting  imaginary 
joys  or  sorrows. 

Vicarious  atonement  and  all  forms  of  vicarious  activity 
are  the  actuating  spirit  of  the  vast  industry  of  honorable 
artistic  Pretense  that  has  flourished  since  the  world  was. 
All  the  world's  a  stage,  as  somebody  has  said,  and  everybody 
is  always  acting.  If  certain  people  charge  money  for  acting, 
that  means  no  mere  than  the  fact  that  most  preachers  charge 
money  for  preaching,  and  doctors  for  doctoring. 

The  acting  in  the  Steddon  home  was  of  the  most  ama 
teurish  quality.  But  then,  the  audience  was  as  amateurish 
as  the  playing,  and  collaborated,  as  audiences  must  if  plays 
are  to  prosper. 

The  girl's  role  was  the  most  difficult  imaginable.  She  had 
to  repress  a  hideous  secret,  conceal  a  frantic  remorse,  rein 
in  a  wild  grief,  and  conduct  it  as  a  gentle  regret. 

She  hated  herself  and  her  enforced  hypocrisy.  Romance 
had  sickened  in  her  like  a  syrup  that  bribes  the  palate  and 
fills  the  stomach  with  nausea.  Her  secret  was  a  vomit,  and 
no  easier  or  pleasanter  to  control.  Her  soul  was  so  ill  of  it 
that  her  very  throat  retched. 

Nausea  was  part  of  her  condition,  too,  and  would  have 
tormented  her  if  she  had  been  the  formal  widow  of  El  wood, 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  37 

instead  of  what  Brander  Matthews  once  phrased  as  "the 
unwedded  mother  of  his  unborn  child." 

She  had  been  trained  from  childhood  to  believe  herself  a 
sinner  lost  in  Adam's  fall,  and  to  search  her  heart  for  things 
to  repent.  She  believed  in  an  actual  hell,  and  her  terrors  of 
the  infernal  griddles  were  as  vivid  as  those  that  poor  little 
seven-year-old  Marjorie  Fleming  wrote  down  in  her  babyish 
diary. 

She  had  great  native  gifts  of  self-punishment,  a  habit 
older  than  Christianity  and  found  in  all  nations.  Did  not 
the  Greeks  and  Latins  have  a  comedy,  "The  Self -tor 
mentor"?  Mem  was  worthy  of  its  long  title.  She  was 
heautcntimoroumena.  Nothing  made  her  more  eager  to  get 
her  gone  from  her  home  town  than  her  fear  that  at  almost 
any  moment  she  would  reach  the  end  of  her  histrionism, 
fling  off  the  mask,  and  tell  the  venomous  truth. 

It  was  not  merely  a  question  of  having  to  lie  or  to  evade 
discovery.  Mem  had  to  dramatize  herself,  to  foresee  situ 
ations,  and  to  force  herself  to  be  another  self,  to  mimic  sin 
cerity  and  simplicity. 

She  was  in  the  trite  situation,  familiar  in  the  theater  and 
in  the  poems  and  stories  about  the  theater,  where  the 
broken-hearted  mummer  must  conceal  from  the  audience  a 
personal  grief. 

It  would  have  been  easier  if  Mem  had  merely  to  play  the 
clown,  for  hilarity  could  be  carried  off  hysterically.  But  her 
role  was  one  of  half-tones,  grays,  and  mild  regrets. 

Many  people  knew  that  she  was  fond  of  Elwood.  Many 
girls  and  boys  called  to  see  her  or  dragged  her  to  the  tele 
phone  to  offer  consolation  and  satisfy  curiosity.  To  them 
she  must  express  a  proper  sorrow  as  a  cordial  friend  without 
letting  them  treat  her  as  too  deeply  involved.  This  was 
bitter  work  and  she  felt  it  a  treachery  to  her  dead  lover. 

To  her  mother  she  must  play  the  same  character.  Her 
mother  may  have  guessed  that  the  tragedy  was  deeper  than 
the  revelation,  but  the  poor  old  soul  had  had  so  much  gloom 
in  her  life  that  she  did  not  demand  more  than  she  got. 

Doctor  Steddon  lived  in  such  clouds  that  he  had  almost 
forgotten  his  refusal  to  let  Elwood  call  on  Mem.  He  knew 


38  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

that  she  had  been  at  the  doctor's  office  when  Elwood  was 
brought  there,  and  the  shock  of  this  explained  what  con 
fusion  he  recognized  in  Mem's  manner. 

He  was  acting,  too,  but  his  acting  was  the  constant  show 
of  cheerfulness.  He  went  about  smiling,  laughing,  talking 
of  Mem's  swift  recovery  in  the  golden  West.  He  said  that 
they  would  all  be  glad  to  get  rid  of  her  for  a  spell.  But  his 
heart  was  a  black  ache  of  despair  and  fear  of  that  death 
which  he  spoke  of  in  the  pulpit  as  a  mere  doorway  to  eternal 
bliss.  His  smiling  muscles  rebelled  when  he  was  alone  and 
he  paced  his  study  like  a  frightened  child,  beating  his  hands 
together  and  whispering  to  his  Father  to  spare  him  this 
unbearable  punishment. 

A  huiricane  struck  the  little  town  of  Calverly  on  the  day 
of  Elwood's  funeral.  When  Mem  expressed  a  wish  to  sing 
with  the  choir  at  the  service  over  their  late  fellow-singer, 
both  mother  and  father  forbade  her  to  think  of  it.  Her 
mother  cried,  "A  girl  who's  got  to  be  shipped  out  West  has 
got  no  right  to  go  out  in  weather  like  this." 

Mem  felt  it  a  crowning  betrayal  of  Elwood  to  let  him  be 
carried  out  to  a  pauper's  grave  in  such  merciless  rain.  Her 
heart  urged  her  to  dash  through  the  streets,  burst  into  the 
church,  and  proclaim  to  the  world  how  she  adored  the  boy. 
But  she  had  to  protect  her  father  and  mother  from  such 
selfish  self-sacrifice  and  such  ruthless  atonement. 

So  she  stayed  at  home  and  stared  through  the  streaming 
windows.  She  saw  her  poor  old  father  set  out  to  preach  the 
funeral  sermon. 

He  had  that  valor  of  the  priests  which  leads  them  to  risk 
death  in  order  to  defeat  death;  to  endure  all  hardship  lest 
the  poorest  soul  go  out  of  the  world  without  a  formal  conge. 
Doctor  Steddon  clutched  his  old  overcoat  about  him  and 
plunged  into  rain  that  hatched  the  air  in  long,  slanting  lines. 
He  had  not  reached  the  gate  when  his  umbrella  went  upward 
into  a  black  calyx.  He  leaned  it  against  the  fence  and  pushed 
on.  Then  his  hat  blew  off  and  skirled  from  pool  to  pool. 
He  ran  after  it,  his  hair  aflutter,  his  bald  spot  spattering 
back  the  rain. 

Miss  Steddon  was  not  missed  at  the  church,  for  there  was 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  39 

nobody  there  to  miss  her.  The  whole  choir  saved  its  voice 
by  staying  away.  Only  the  Farnaby  family  went  dripping 
up  the  aisle  and  back. 

The  hearse  and  two  hacks  moped  past  the  window  where 
Mem  watched.  On  the  boxes  the  drivers  sat,  the  shabbiest 
men  on  earth  at  best,  but  now  peculiarly  sordid  as  they 
slumped  in  their  wet  overcoats,  disgusted  and  dejected,  their 
hats  blown  over  their  faces,  their  whips  aggravating  the 
misery,  but  not  the  speed,  of  the  sodden  nags  that  might 
have  wished  it  their  own  funeral. 

Mem  had  to  leave  the  window.  Her  impulse  was  to  run 
out  and  follow  the  miserable  cortege,  to  tear  wet  flowers 
from  the  gardens  and  strew  the  road  with  them,  to  fill  the 
grave  with  them  and  shelter  Elwood  from  the  pelting  rain. 
It  was  a  funeral  like  that  in  which  Mozart's  body  was  lost 
and,  like  his  widow,  Mem  had  to  mourn  at  home. 

It  was  her  meek  fear  of  being  dramatic  and  conspicuous 
that  saved  her  from  the  temptation  to  publish  her  concern. 
But  she  stumbled  up  to  her  room  and  let  her  grief  have  sway. 
She  smothered  her  sobs  as  bast  she  could  in  the  old  com 
forter  of  her  bed,  but  the  other  children  heard  her  and  asked 
questions.  Her  mother  kept  them  away  from  her  and  did 
not  go  near  herself,  feeling  that  this  was  one  of  the  times 
when  sympathy  gives  most  comfort  by  absence. 

When  her  eyes  were  faint  with  exhaustion  and  could 
squeeze  no  more  tears,  when  her  thorax  could  not  jerk  out 
another  sob,  her  soul  lay  becalmed  in  utter  inanition.  Then 
she  heard  a  hack  drive  up  to  the  gate  and  heard  her  father's 
hurried  rush  for  the  porch. 

The  old  man  was  chilled  through  by  his  graveside  piayer, 
but  forgetful  of  himself  in  the  exaltation  of  his  office,  and  all 
ababble  of  pity  for  his  client. 

Mem  heard  her  mother  scolding  him  out  of  his  wet  clothes 
into  dry,  but  he  kept  up  his  chatter: 

"  It  isn't  always  easy  to  find  nice  things  to  say  at  funerals, 
but  there  was  everything  fine  to  be  said  over  that  poor  boy 
— a  good,  hard-working  lad  that  slaved  for  his  mother  and 
went  to  church  regular,  and —  Why,  I  don't  suppose  he 
ever  had  an  evil  thought," 


40  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

Mem  sank  into  a  chair  by  her  window.  The  rain  whipped 
the  panes  and  the  wind  rattled  them  in  the  chipped  putty 
that  held  them  to  the  casement. 

The  last  few  days  had  kept  her  thoughts  so  busy  that  she 
had  neglected  her  housewifery  a  little.  She  was  shocked  to 
see  that  a  spider  had  spread  a  web  from  the  shutter  to  the 
vine. 

The  gale  had  torn  the  web  to  shreds  and  was  threatening 
to  rip  it  loose.  The  spider,  sopping  and  pearled  with  rain, 
was  having  a  desperate  battle  to  keep  from  being  swept 
away.  He  clung  and  caught  new  holds  as  a  sailor  clutches 
the  shrouds  in  a  tempest. 

The  girl  felt  a  kinship  with  the  poor  beastie.  Her  soul  and 
her  body  were  like  spider  and  web,  and  a  great  storm  menaced 
them  both.  Her  flesh  seemed  but  a  frail  network  that  spasms 
of  sobbing  or  of  coughing  threatened  to  tear  to  pieces.  Her 
soul  was  a  loathsome  arachnid  spinning  traps  for  flies,  and 
storms  of  remorse  and  grief  threatened  to  dislodge  it  and 
send  it  down  the  wind  of  eternity.  But  still  her  body  clung 
to  life  and  her  soul  to  her  body. 

She  began  to  long  to  be  shut  of  the  town,  however,  and 
the  dull  playhouse  where  she  enacted  over  and  over  the  same 
dull  drama  to  the  same  dull  audience. 

Her  father  and  mother  drove  her  almost  mad  by  their 
devoted  gentleness.  Hitherto  they  had  both  been  strict,  and 
a  little  tiresome  with  moral  lessons  and  rebukes,  making 
goodness  a  dull  staple  suspiciously  overadvertised,  and 
creating  rebellion  by  discipline. 

But  after  the  doctor's  first  visit  they  heaped  almost 
intolerable  coals  of  fire  upon  her  head  with  their  devoted 
faith  in  her.  If  they  had  any  doubts  of  her  future  it 
was  only  of  the  wicked  people  outside  the  fold  who 
would  attack  and  beguile  their  ewe  lamb.  They  never 
suspected  her  of  even  the  capacity  for  sin,  though  she 
felt  that  it  was  she  who  had  seduced  her  sacred  lover, 
and  not  he  her. 

At  times  her  parents  treated  her  with  that  unquestioning 
approval  we  grant  only  to  the  newly  dead,  and  the  un 
merited  homage  was  harder  to  endure  than  unearned  blame, 


SOULS    FOR   SALE  41 

since  it  had  a  belittling  influence  where  the  other  would 
have  aroused  self-esteem. 

She  was  no  longer  at  home  at  home.  She  had  to  draw  on 
a  mask  the  moment  she  came  in.  When  she  went  to  the 
doctor's  office  she  encountered  truth  and  the  frank  facing 
of  it ;  she  could  be  herself,  a  normal  young  animal  who  had 
done  a  natural  thing,  unluckily,  and  had  lost  none  of  her 
rights  to  life,  wealth,  or  the  pursuit  of  happiness.  When 
she  stepped  off  the  Bretherick  porch  she  was  a  very  alle 
gory  of  defiant  youth ;  when  she  stepped  on  to  her  ow~n  porch 
she  became  immediately  a  Magdalen  bowed  with  a  shame 
she  dared  not  even  ask  forgiveness  for. 

It  was  particularly  hard  to  act  a  part  all  day  long,  and 
every  day,  since  she  had  never  been  an  actress  before.  If 
her  audience  of  two  had  had  more  familiarity  with  the  art, 
she  might  not  have  succeeded  in  duping  both  so  completely. 
But  they  never  dreamed  of  the  truth.  Deceiving  them  was 
so  easy  that  she  despised  herself.  Especially  she  loathed 
herself  for  taking  their  paltry  savings.  They  had  foreseen 
the  cruel  days  that  lie  ahead  of  superannuated  preachers, 
and  had  somehow  managed  to  put  away  a  little  hoard  against 
the  inevitable  famine,  though  this  meant  that  even  their 
prosperity  was  always  just  this  side  of  pauperdom. 

But  they  lavished  their  tiny  wealth  upon  their  scapegrace 
daughter  and  never  imagined  that  the  real  cause  for  her 
spendthrift  voyage  was  to  save  herself  and  them  from  the 
catastrophe  of  a  public  scandal. 

Money  is  always  the  most  emotional  of  human  concerns, 
though  it  is  the  least  celebrated  in  romance. 

Again  and  again  Mem  revolted  at  the  outrage  of  robbing 
her  own  parents  of  their  one  shield  against  old  age.  She 
went  again  and  again  to  Doctor  Bretherick  and  demanded 
that  he  release  her  from  her  promises  not  to  tell  the  truth 
and  not  to  kill  herself.  But  he  compelled  her  to  his  will, 
and  she  was  too  glad  for  a  will  to  replace  her  own  panic  to 
resist  him.  For  a  necessary  stimulant,  he  prophesied  that 
somehow  in  that  land  of  gold  she  was  seeking  she  would 
find  such  wealth  that  she  could  repay  her  parents  their  loan 

with  usury,  with  wealth,  perhaps.    Who  knew? 
4 


42  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

"In  these  times,"  he  said,  "it's  the  girls  who  are  running 
away  from  home  to  find  their  fortunes.  And  lots  of  'em 
are  rinding  'em. 

"Your  dear  old  fool  of  a  father  is  always  preaching  about 
the  good  old  days  when  women  were  respected  and  respect 
able,  when  parents  were  revered  and  took  care  of  their 
children.  As  my  boy  says,  where  does  he  get  that  stuff? 

"He  knows  better!  Why  does  he  have  to  lie  about  it  so 
piously?  Why  don't  they  use  some  plain  horse  sense,  some 
truth  with  a  little  t  in  the  pulpit  once  in  a  while  and  not  so 
much  Truth  with  a  capital  T? 

"In  the  'good  old  days'  the  best  parents  used  to  whip 
their  children  nearly  to  death;  the  poor  ones  bound  them 
out  as  apprentices  into  child  slavery,  chained  'em  to  factories 
for  fourteen  hours  a  day.  They  had  no  child-labor  laws,  no 
societies  for  prevention  of  cruelty  to  children,  no  children's 
court,  no  Boy  Scouts  or  Girl  Scouts,  and  the  wickedness 
was  frightful.  And  as  for  the  grown-up  girls,  most  of  them 
had  no  education  and  no  chance  for  ambition.  If  they  went 
wrong  they  could  go  to  a  convent,  or  slink  around  the  back 
streets,  or  go  out  and  walk  the  streets  at  night.  The  drunken 
ness  and  debauchery  and  disease  were  hideous.  Even  the 
Sabbath  breaking  and  skepticism  were  universal.  But  still 
they  call  'em  the  'good  old  days.' 

"And  they  dare  to  praise  them  above  these  glorious  days 
when  women  are  for  the  first  time  free.  And  men  were 
never  free,  either,  till  now;  for  men  had  the  responsibility 
of  women's  souls  on  their  own.  And,  my  God !  what  a  burden 
it  was  and  how  they  boggled  it! 

"This  is  really  the  year  One.  Now  at  last  a  girl  like  you 
can  look  life  in  the  face,  and  if  she  makes  a  mistake  she  can 
make  her  life  worth  while  and  not  fall  into  the  mewling, 
puling,  parasite  and  disease  germ  of  the  good  old-fashioned 
woman.  You  ought  to  thank  God  for  letting  you  live  now, 
and  you've  got  to  show  Him  how  much  you  prize  the  golden 
opportunity.  It's  just  sunup;  this  is  the  dawn  of  the  day 
when  man  and  woman  are  equal  and  children  have  a  clean 
sky  overhead. 

"I  was  reading  the  other  day  a  list  a  mile  long  of  self- 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  43 

made  women  who  had  begun  poor  and  finished  rich.  Some 
of  'em  made  their  wealth  out  of  candy  and  some  of  'em  in 
Wall  Street;  some  of  'em  in  all  sorts  of  arts — paintings, 
novels,  plays,  music,  acting.  You  might  go  into  the  movies, 
for  instance,  and  make  more  money  than  Coal  Oil  Johnny. 

"It's  scandalous  what  some  of  those  little  tykes  are  earn 
ing.  I  tell  you,  Mem,  if  you've  got  any  spunk  you'll  make 
yourself  a  millionairess.  All  this  suffering  is  education.  All 
this  acting  you're  doing  may  show  you  the  way  to  glory. 
Go  West,  young  woman,  and  go  up  in  the  world!" 

"I've  never  been  anywhere  or  seen  anything.  I've  never 
even  seen  a  movie,"  said  Mem. 

"Well,  as  the  feller  said  who  was  asked  if  he  could  play 
the  violin,  he  didn't  know,  he'd  never  tried.  When  you  get 
a  safe  distance  from  any  danger  of  giving  your  pa  apoplexy, 
sneak  into  a  movie  and  see  if  you  see  anything  you  can't 
do.  Looks  like  to  me  you  might  cut  quite  a  swath  there. 
Prob'ly  you'd  have  to  learn  to  ride  a  horse,  throw  a  lassoo, 
and  dance;  but  fallin'  off  trains  and  bein'  spilled  off  cliffs 
in  automobiles  oughtn't  to  take  much  talent.  And  it  can't 
be  very  risky,  since  I  see  the  same  young  ladies  runnin'  the 
same  gantlets  and  comin'  up  smilin'  in  the  next  picture. 
There's  a  serial  at  the  Palace  once  a  week  that  shows  one 
wide-eyed  lassie  who  is  absolutely  bullet-proof.  They  can't 
drown  that  girl,  burn  her,  freeze  her,  or  poison  her.  She 
laughs  at  gravity,  bounces  off  roofs  and  cliffs  and  bobs  up 
serenely  from  below.  Her  throat  simply  can't  be  throttled; 
she  can  take  care  of  herself  anywheres.  Why,  I've  seen  her 
overpower  nearly  a  hundred  bandits  so  far,  and  she  looks 
fresher  than  ever.  If  I  was  you  I'd  take  a  whack  at  it." 

"Do  they  have  movies  in  Tuckson?" 

"I  think  likely.  I  hear  they've  got  'em  on  both  Poles, 
North  and  South." 

Mem  imbibed  mysterious  tonics  at  the  doctor's  office, 
and  always  came  away  buoyed  up  with  the  feeling  that  her 
tragedy  was  unimportant,  commonplace,  and  sure  to  have  a 
happy  finish. 

But  the  moment  she  reached  home  she  entered  a  demesne 
where  everything  was  solemn,  where  jokes  were  never  heard, 


44  SOULS    FOR   SALE 

except  pathetic  old  witticisms  more  important  in  intention 
than  in  amusement. 

They  began  to  irritate  her,  to  wear  her  raw  and  exacer 
bate  her  tenderest  feelings.  She  was  beginning  to  be  ruined 
by  the  very  influences  that  should  have  sweetened  her  soul. 

And  at  last,  one  day,  quite  unexpectedly,  when  she  was 
under  no  apparent  tension  at  all,  when  her  father  had  gone 
to  visit  a  sick  parishioner  and  her  mother  was  quietly  at 
work  upon  Mem's  traveling  clothes,  the  girl  reached  the 
end  of  her  resources. 

Perhaps  it  was  a  noble  revolt  against  interminable  deceit. 
Perhaps  it  was  a  selfish  impulse  to  fling  off  a  little  of  her 
back-breaking  burden  of  silence.  Perhaps  it  was  a  mad 
desire  to  make  some  one  else  a  partner  in  her  lies.  Perhaps 
it  was  the  unendurable  hum  of  her  mother's  sewing  machine. 

Whatever  it  was  that  moved  her,  she  rose  quietly,  put 
down  her  needlework,  went  into  Mrs.  Steddon's  room,  closed 
the  door,  took  her  mother's  hands  from  the  cloth  they  were 
guiding,  and  said,  in  a  quiet  tone: 

"  Mamma,  I  want  to  tell  you  something.  I'd  rather  break 
your  heart  than  deceive  you  any  longer." 

"Why,  honey!  What's  the  matter?  Why,  Mem  dear, 
what  on  earth  is  it?  Sit  down  and  tell  your  mother,  of 
course.  You  can't  break  this  tough  old  heart  of  mine.  What 
is  it,  baby?" 

She  whispered  it  so  softly  that  her  breath  was  hardly 
syllabled.  Her  mother  caught  less  the  words  than  the  hiss 
and  rustle  of  her  awe  and  the  wild  language  of  her  trapped 
eyes: 

"Mamma,  I — I'm  going  to  have — to  have  a  baby." 

The  shock  was  its  own  ether.  Mrs.  Steddon  whispered 
back,  cowering: 

"You?    You!    My  baby!    You?    A  baby?" 

Mem  nodded  and  nodded  till  her  knees  were  on  the  floor 
and  her  brow  in  her  mother's  lap.  Old  hands  came  grop 
ingly  about  her  cheeks.  She  felt  the  drip,  drip  of  tears  falling 
into  her  hair,  each  tear  a  separate  pearl  from  a  crown  of 
pride. 

Then  the  shivering  hands  at  her  cheeks  lifted  her  face  and 


SOULS   FOR   SALE  45 

she  stared  up,  as  much  amazed  as  her  mother,  in  whose 
downward  stare  there  was  no  horror  or  reproach,  only  com 
passion  and  infinite  fear.  And  her  mother  fumbled  at  the 
dreadful  question: 

"But  who— who—  " 

"Elwood." 

The  hands  upholding  her  head  dropped  limp.  The  eyes 
above  her  were  dry,  blank,  and  ghastly:  the  mind  behind 
them  baffled  beyond  effort.  Then  they  grew  human  again 
with  a  sudden  throb  of  tears  upon  tears.  And  her  mother 
groaned  with  double  pity. 

1 '  Poor  baby !    Poor  Mem !    Poor  little  thing ! ' ' 

Grandmothers  acquire  a  witchlike  knowledge  of  life. 
They  know  the  things  that  may  not  be  published.  They  see 
the  cruel  wickednesses  of  the  world  overwhelming  their 
own  beloved  ones,  and  an  awful  wisdom  is  theirs.  They 
know  something  of  the  mockery  of  punishment  and  they  are 
usually  derided  by  the  less  experienced  for  their  lax  ideas  of 
the  miserable  bungling  called  justice. 

Mem's  confession  was  an  annunciation  of  grandmother- 
hood  to  Mrs.  Steddon.  She  was  so  stunned  that  she  ex 
pressed  no  horror  at  the  abyss  of  horror  yawning  before 
her  feet.  Two  instincts  prevailed  while  her  reason  was  in 
a  stupor — love  of  her  husband,  love  of  her  child. 

The  decision  was  easy,  and  she  made  no  difficulty  of  the 
gross  deceits  involved.  Her  husband  must  be  protected 
in  his  illusions  and  protected  from  the  necessity  of  wreaking 
his  high  moral  principles  on  his  own  child.  His  child  must 
be  protected  from  the  merciless  world  and  the  immediate 
wrath  of  the  village. 

She  said  little;  she  caressed  much.  She  confirmed  Doctor 
Bretherick's  prescription  and  joined  the  conspiracy,  adminis 
tering  secret  comfort  to  the  girl  and  to  the  father. 

The  nearer  the  day  of  Mem's  departure,  the  slower 
dragged  the  hours  between.  But  at  last  she  was  standing  on 
the  back  platform  of  a  train  bound  for  the  vast  Southwest. 
She  was  throwing  tear-sprent  kisses  to  her  father  and  mother 
as  they  blurred  into  the  distance. 

They  watched  the  train  dwindling  like  a  telescope  drawn 


46  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

into  itself,  as  so  many  parents  have  watched  so  many  trains 
and  ships  and  carriages  vanish  into  space  with  the  beloved 
of  their  hearts  and  bodies. 

They  turned  back  to  their  lives  as  if  they  had  closed  a  door 
upon  themselves. 

But  Mem,  as  she  returned  to  her  place  in  the  car,  felt  as 
if  a  portcullis  had  lifted.  Before  her  was  All-Outdoors. 


CHAPTER   VII 

THE  wheels  ran  with  a  rollicking  lilt  beneath  the  girl's 
body,  throbbing  likewise  with  a  zest  of  velocity.  Through 
her  head  an  old  tune  ran  that  she  had  often  sung  with  the 
home-coming  crowds  on  church  picnics: 

I  saw  the  boat  go  round  the  ben*, 
The  deck  was  filled  with  traveling  men. 
Good-by,  my  lover,  good-by! 

She  was  on  a  train  going  round  bend  after  bend,  and  the 
train  was  filled  with  traveling  men.  Some  of  them,  as  they 
zigzagged  along  the  aisles,  swept  her  face  and  her  form  with 
glances  like  swift,  lingering  hands  that  hated  to  let  her  go. 
This  was  a  startling  sensation,  a  new  kind  of  nakedness  for 
her  inexperienced  soul. 

The  eyes  of  the  women  flung  along  the  aisle  also  widened 
and  tarried  as  they  recognized  in  her  a  something  she  had 
not  yet  found  out :  that  she  was  very,  very  pretty — attrac 
tive,  compulsive.  She  was  like  a  magnet  that  had  never 
met  iron  filings  before,  had  never  learned  the  mystery  and 
could  not  understand  it,  as  we  think  we  understand  what  is 
merely  familiar. 

She  was  plainly  dressed  and  had  never  been  adorned. 
Only  her  neatness  kept  her  from  shabbiness.  But  she  had 
beauty  and  appeal,  the  appeal  of  a  ripe  peach  grown  in  some 
body's  orchard  but  thrust  out  over  a  wayside  fence  to  tempt 
the  passer-by.  Some  of  the  men  who  saw  her  did  not  care 
for  peaches,  or  had  had  their  fill  of  them,  and  regarded  her 
with  indifference .  But  others  looked  hungry,  or  at  least 
betrayed  an  academic  approval. 

Such  of  the  women  as  had  no  instinct  of  jealousy  were 
gladdened  by  her  prettiness  and  her  youth,  and  felt  that  she 


48  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

brightened  the  roadside  and  sweetened  the  air.  Others  saw 
in  her  a  rival,  a  danger;  and  suspicion  narrowed  their  lids. 
They  consoled  themselves  with  the  thought  that  she  was 
wicked  and  worthless — an  opinion  which  they  could  not 
know  she  shared  with  them. 

On  the  train  Mem  had  planned  to  do  a  bit  of  thinking. 
But  after  the  first  exultance  of  escape  and  the  thrill  of  speed 
she  relapsed  into  despondency  and  fear — fear  of  everything 
and  everybody.  She  had  still  to  act,  but  she  was  a  strolling 
player  now  with  an  ever-changing  audience.  And  this  gave 
her  a  new  kind  of  stage  fright.  The  only  familiar  companion 
was  remorse.  She  could  not  run  away  from  that.  Running 
away  was  a  new  subject  for  remorse. 

She  thought  of  herself  as  a  convict  escaped  breathless 
from  a  deserved  punishment  to  a  wilderness  of  uncertainties 
— as  a  trusty  who  has  betrayed  the  confidence  of  a  kindly 
warden  and  rewarded  confidence  with  deceit. 

She  had  expected  to  find  on  the  journey  leisure  for  con 
trition  and  the  remolding  of  her  soul.  But  the  world  would 
not  let  her  alone.  Everything  was  new  to  her.  Everything 
was  a  crowded  film  of  novelty. 

She  knew  the  minimum  of  the  outside  sphere  possible 
to  a  girl  who  had  had  any  education  at  all. 

She  had  never  been  on  a  sleeping  car  before. 

She  had  read  no  novels  except  such  sweetened  water  as 
the  Sunday-school  library  afforded.  She  had  seen  no  maga 
zines  at  home  except  the  church  publications;  and  her  girl 
friends  happened  to  be  infrequent  readers  of  fiction. 

Calverly  had  no  bookstore  and  the  news  stands  did  little 
trade  in  the  periodicals  that  are  credited  with  the  ruin  of  the 
young  when  the  critics  have  time  enough  to  spare  from  the 
theater  and  moving  picture  and  the  dance. 

She  had  never  been  to  a  theater  or  a  moving  picture. 
She  had  never  danced  even  a  square  dance,  not  so  much  as 
a  Dan  Tucker,  a  Virginia  reel,  or  a  minuet  in  costume. 

She  had  never  ridden  a  bicycle  or  a  horse,  and  had  never 
been  in  any  automobile  except  some  old  bone-shaker  that 
drowned  conversation  in  its  own  rattle. 

She  had  never  gambled,  or  been  profane  or  even  slangy 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  49 

or   disrespectful   to  her  parents.    She  had   never  seen  a 
cocktail. 

She  had  never  worn  a  low-necked,  high-skirted  dress. 
She  had  never  seen  a  bathing  suit  or  had  one  on.  Girls  did 
not  swim  in  the  river  at  Calverly.  In  fact,  she  had  escaped 
all  the  things  that  moralists  point  to  as  the  reasons  why  girls 
go  wrong.  Yet  she  had,  as  the  saying  is,  gone  wrong — 
utterly,  indubitably. 

Yet  no  fast  young  men  had  led  her  astray,  or  so  much  as 
tried  to  lead  her  astray.  She  had  never  made  the  acquaint 
ance  of  a  fast  young  man.  Her  betrothed  lover  was  slow 
and  honorable  and  religious,  everything  a  young  man  ought 
to  be.  But,  unfortunately  for  her,  one  of  the  things  a  young 
man  ought  to  be,  must  be  if  he  is  a  man,  is  passionate;  other 
wise  he  can  never  be  a  husband  or  a  father;  and  a  woman 
cannot  be  a  good  wife  and  mother  if  she  lacks  those  fires 
which  burn  when  they  escape — and  which  no  power  has  ever 
kept  from  occasional  untimely  escape. 

And  so  on  a  Sabbath  evening  the  solemn  young  man  to 
whom  she  was  affianced  had  been  somehow  impelled,  by 
seeing  through  the  window  her  parents  kissing  her  good 
night,  to  want  to  add  his  kiss  to  theirs.  On  the  porch  that 
frowned  out  the  heathen  moon  he  had  held  her  hand  a  little 
more  straitly  than  was  his  wont.  He  had  drawn  her  to  him 
and  moved  toward  her.  There  seemed  to  be  volition  in 
neither  of  them;  they  just  floated  together  with  a  mysterious 
bewilderment. 

She  had  looked  up  in  questioning  surprise  at  the  hot 
strength  of  his  handclasp.  He  had  looked  down  at  her  in 
questioning  surprise  at  the  unusual  beauty  of  her  shadow- 
blotted  face.  Not  seeing  her  at  all,  she  was  somehow  more 
beautiful  than  ever,  since  imagination  had  free  sweep.  And 
who  can  give  laws  to  imagination? 

Their  lips  had  moved  together  by  the  same  amazing 
attraction.  The  hasty  brushing  of  her  mouth  with  his  had 
been  like  the  drawing  of  a  match  along  a  kindling  surface, 
and  he  had  been  impelled  to  return  for  another  kiss,  a 
longer  kiss,  the  strangest  kiss  that  either  had  ever  known. 
And  then  a  strange,  a  terrifying,  irresistible  mood  had  imbued 


50  SOULS    FOR   SALE 

them  both.  His  arms  were  suddenly  like  fierce  serpents 
about  her,  ruthless  with  constriction.  Her  arms  were 
serpents  suddenly. 

They  seemed  to  feel  a  necessity  for  becoming  one;  their 
hearts  were  turned  to  a  sweet,  shivering,  poisonous  jelly. 
Their  blinded  eyes  were  clenched  to  shut  out  the  world 
and  shut  in  the  heaven  that  lifted  them  as  on  the  little  wings 
of  cherubim. 

Mem  closed  her  eyes  in  a  sudden  return  of  memory  like  a 
re-experience.  She  almost  swooned  with  a  terror  of  remem 
brance,  and  her  repentance  seemed  to  flee,  contemptible  and 
ridiculous,  as  her  reason  had  fled  from  that  first  visit  of 
romance. 

She  was  astounded  at  herself.  She  felt  a  hypocrite  even 
to  herself.  She  was  not  really  sorry !  She  could  never  trust 
herself  to  learn.  In  spite  of  all  that  had  proved  the  folly  and 
the  evil  of  her  mistake,  she  wondered  if  it  would  not  always 
recur  to  her  as  somehow  a  divine  madness  wiser  far  than  any 
earthly  reason. 

Her  brain  was  scorched  with  a  furious  thought  whipping 
through  it  like  a  laughing  flame.  A  mocking  Lilith  seemed 
to  be  laughing  at  her  holier  self.  A  new  being  inside  her  soul 
was  rejoicing  that  she  had  given  herself  in  all  ecstasy  to 
Elwood  before  he  died.  Even  if  he  were  damned  for  it,  it 
seemed  well  that  he  should  not  have  left  this  earth  and 
this  flesh  without  knowing  its  Paradise. 

There  was  neither  marrying  nor  giving  in  marriage  where 
he  had  gone,  and  their  reunion  would  have  been  a  bodiless 
greeting  of  ghosts  if  this  sweet  world  had  not  overwhelmed 
them  and  their  worldly  frames  with  its  supreme  rapture. 

Elwood  had  never  known  anything  but  poverty,  hard 
work,  poor  food,  none  of  the  silk  and  satin,  none  of  the 
revelry  and  the  wine  and  the  splendor  of  the  world.  He  had 
known  nothing  rich  but  her  love. 

He  had  been  caught  at  his  self-denial,  putting  a  little  of 
his  earnings  into  the  pitiful  savings  he  had  achieved.  He 
had  been  struck  as  with  a  great  shell  and  shattered  like  the 
splintered  glass  that  filled  his  poor,  crushed  body.  He  had 
died  fighting  against  any  outcry  of  protest  or  of  pain.  He 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  51 

had  died  muttering  something  that  nobody  knew — but  she 
felt  that  he  was  stammering  her  name  with  his  all-obliterated 
lips. 

And  her  body  was  one  music,  her  members  chanted  a 
triumphant  song,  because  his  body  had  known  the  symphonic 
music  of  her  love. 

Then  the  rhapsody  died  away.  The  Lilith  vanished  from 
her  mood,  and  the  little  gray  Puritan  named  Remember 
came  back  to  the  profaned  shrine  of  her  soul,  aghast,  incredu 
lous,  revolted.  Romance  had  turned  to  a  gargoyle  of  gro 
tesque  and  obscene  ugliness.  She  could  not  believe  herself 
or  trust  her  own  profoundest  faiths  again. 

She  was  afraid  and  felt  herself  condemned  to  destruction. 
She  was  a  scapegoat  going  out  into  the  wilderness,  but 
capable  of  sudden  frenzies  of  pride  in  her  burden  of  sin, 
incapable  of  shaking  it  off,  afraid  of  being  lonely  without  it. 

She  returned  slowly  from  the  blind  voyage  of  her  soul 
into  the  invisible  and  wondered  what  had  passed  before  her 
eyes  in  the  long  interim.  She  was  learning  to  know  herself 
and  in  herself  to  know  humanity.  Her  ignorance  had  been 
abysmal.  To  those  who  can  believe  ignorance  beautiful, 
it  had  been  ideal.  There  was  peace  of  a  sort  in  those  shel 
tered  canons,  but  now  she  was  climbing  the  mountains,  the 
crags.  She  would  see  strange  snows,  strange  flowers,  ex 
quisite  deserts,  smothering  Edens. 

The  clanking  uproar  of  the  entrance  into  Kansas  City 
filled  her  ears  and  drove  away  the  music  of  the  fiends. 
Factories,  warehouses,  freight  trains,  roundhouses,  warning 
bells  at  street  crossings  where  watchmen  stood  with  flags 
before  long  bars,  all  the  usual  noisy  bustle  of  approach  to  a 
large  town  assailed  her.  The  train  seemed  to  hurry,  though 
it  went  more  slowly.  It  was  the  plenitude  of  objects  of 
interest  that  gave  it  the  illusion  of  speed,  as  it  is  in  the 
passage  of  a  life. 

Mem  had  never  seen  a  great  city,  and  this  metropolis  had 
a  tremendous  majesty  in  her  eyes. 

Some  of  the  passengers  from  Eastern  points  were  getting 
off  and  she  was  fascinated  to  see  how  the  porter  whisk- 
broomed  their  coats  and  hats  and  palmed  their  tips  with 


52  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

an  almost  dancing  rhythm.  One  of  the  portly  women  passen 
gers,  whose  voice  had  out  clicked  the  wheels,  asked  the 
porter  how  long  the  train  would  stop,  and  when  the  diplomat 
said,  "Eight  minutes,  miss,"  she  made  a  loud  declaration  of 
her  intention  to  stretch  her  legs.  Others  made  ready  for  a 
breath  of  air.  And  so  did  Mem,  who  was  spying  and  eaves 
dropping  011  everybody,  picking  up  what  hints  she  could  to 
disguise  her  ignorance  of  travel  and  appear  as  a  complete 
railroader. 

The  passengers  choked  the  straight  corridor  along  the  row 
of  compartments,  and  Mem  took  her  place  in  the  line.  One 
of  the  doors  opened  and  framed  a  tall  and  powerful  young 
man  with  a  peculiarly  wistful  face.  His  eyes  brushed  Mem 
and  he  lifted  his  hat  as  he  asked  her  pardon  for  squeezing 
past  her. 

He  knocked  at  another  steel  door  and  called  through, 
"Oh,  Robina,  better  come  out  for  a  bit  of  exercise." 

While  he  waited,  some  of  the  passengers  were  twisting 
their  necks  to  watch  him,  and  nudging  and  whispering  to 
one  another.  When  the  door  opened  and  Robina  stepped 
out  there  was  such  a  sensation  and  such  a  boorish  staring 
that  Mem  turned  to  look. 

A  young  woman  of  an  almost  dazzling  beauty  came  out, 
smiling  and  bareheaded.  She  noted  the  yokelry  in  the  corri 
dor,  and  her  smile  died.  She  stepped  back  into  her  state 
room,  and  when  she  reappeared,  she  wore  a  large  drooping 
hat  and  a  thick  black  veil. 

"I  envy  you  the  privilege  of  the  veil,"  the  young  man 
said.  Mem  could  not  hear  her  answer,  for  the  passengers 
began  to  move  out,  and  she  was  carried  forward  with  them 
to  the  steps  and  the  station  platform  into  a  morass  of  hand 
bags  and  red-capped  negro  porters.  She  escaped  the  tangle 
and  found  a  clear  space  for  her  promenade. 

It  gave  her  extraordinary  exhilaration  to  be  in  a  strange 
city.  It  was  Cathay  to  her. 

Mem  walked  up  and  down  the  platform  as  if  her  feet  were 
winged.  There  was  a  delightful  frightfulness  about  wonder 
ing  what  she  would  do  if  the  engine  started  suddenly.  She 
would  like  to  run  and  swing  aboard  like  a  professional  train- 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  53 

man.  When  she  saw  that  the  engine  had  unlinked  itself  and 
departed  into  the  distance  beyond  the  cave  of  the  station, 
she  felt  safe  enough  to  explore  all  the  way  up  to  the  baggage 
car. 

The  baggage  men  and  mail  crew  looked  at  her  with  that 
new  way  these  foreigners  had  of  looking  at  her,  and  she  turned 
back.  The  other  passengers  trudging  up  and  down  stared 
at  her — the  men  especially — all  except  the  tall  young  fellow 
with  the  veiled  lady.  The  rest  were  a  funny  lot,  bareheaded 
or  in  traveling  caps.  She  noted  how  they  followed  the  tall 
young  man  and  commented  on  his  partner.  But  she  could 
not  catch  their  words. 

Some  of  the  strollers  bought  things  to  eat  from  boys  who 
carried  baskets  of  oranges,  chocolate,  chewing  gum,  and 
cigars.  Mem  felt  a  longing  to  buy  something  for  the  sheer 
sport  of  buying.  But  she  had  no  money  for  extravagances. 

Still,  when  she  saw  a  newsman  with  a  cargo  of  magazines, 
she  could  not  resist  the  appeal.  She  would  charge  it  off  to 
education.  She  went  so  far  as  to  buy  two  magazines  devoted 
to  the  moving  pictures.  She  had  the  curiosity  of  Blue 
beard's  final  wife  concerning  that  forbidden  closet. 

As  she  was  picking  out  the  exact  change  from  the  small 
money  in  her  purse,  one  of  the  magazines  slipped  from 
under  her  elbow  and  fell  to  the  ground. 

She  turned  and  stooped  to  recover  it.  Her  hand  touched 
a  hand  that  had  just  anticipated  hers.  She  looked  up 
quickly  and  her  head  knocked  off  the  hat  of  the  man  who 
had  tried  to  save  her  the  trouble  of  picking  up  her  magazine. 
Their  noses  were  so  close  together  that  he  seemed  to  have 
only  one  Cyclopean  eye. 

Each  thinking  that  the  other  had  the  priority,  both  stood 
up  with  a  nervous  laugh.  She  saw  that  the  gallant  was  the 
tall  youth  who  had  crushed  past  her  in  the  corridor. 

His  face  vanished  from  her  sight  as  he  bent  again  to  pick 
up  her  magazine  and  his  hat.  Then  his  face  came  up  again 
like  a  sun  dawning  across  her  horizon;  his  eyes  beat  upon 
her  like  long  beams.  There  was  a  kind  of  pathos  in  them, 
but  also  a  great  brightness,  which,  like  the  sun,  he  poured 
upon  millions  alike.  But  Mem  did  not  know  this.  She  felt 


54  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

warmed  and  healed,  and  she  bloomed  a  trifle  as  a  rose  does 
when  the  sun  gilds  it.  Meanwhile,  with  great  calm  and  as 
much  of  a  bow  as  he  could  make  without  a  sense  of  intrusion, 
the  young  man  solemnly  offered  Mem  his  own  hat  and  laid 
her  magazine  on  his  head. 

Then  both  of  them  laughed  as  he  corrected  the  automatic 
mistake  of  his  muscles.  He  blushed  hotly,  for  he  was  not 
used  to  such  blunders. 

Mem  found  an  amazing  magnetism  in  his  smile  and  in  his 
eyes.  She  did  not  know  that  that  sad  smile  of  his  was 
making  a  millionaire  of  him.  He  was  selling  it  by  the  foot — 
thousands  of  feet  of  it.  His  smile  was  broad  enough  to  cir 
cumscribe  the  world  and  his  eyes  had  enough  sorrow  for  all 
the  audiences. 

He  did  not  take  advantage  of  the  opportunity  for  further 
conversation,  but  bowed  again  and  turned  back  to  the  waiting 
Robina,  leaving  Mem  in  a  kind  of  abrupt  shadow,  as  if  the 
sun  had  gone  under  a  cloud.  Robina  was  evidently  not 
used  to  being  kept  waiting.  She  had  had  little  practice. 
She  resented  the  slight  with  such  quick  wrath  that  Mem 
could  hear  her  protesting  sarcasm,  a  rather  disappointing 
rebuke : 

"Don't  hurry  on  my  account,  Tom."  So  his  name  was 
Tom !  All  that  grandeur  and  grace,  and  only  Tom  for  a  title ! 

Robina's  voice  was  not  magnetic.  But  then,  she  was  not 
selling  her  voice. 

Mem  was  in  such  a  flutter  that  she  dropped  her  purse,  the 
coins  popping  about  like  cranberries.  Robina  saw  the 
catastrophe,  but  she  had  seen  women  drop  things  on  pur 
pose  when  men  were  near,  and  she  held  Tom's  arm  so  that 
he  could  neither  see  the  disaster  nor  lend  his  aid  again. 

As  Mem  knelt  and  plucked  up  a  penny  here,  a  quarter 
there,  two  young  girls  assailed  Robina's  prisoner  with  shame 
less  idolatry.  She  paused,  kneeling,  and  listened.  One  of 
them  rattled  on: 

"Oh,  Mr.  Holby,  we  knew  you  the  minute  we  laid  eyes 
on  you.  You're  our  fave-rite  of  all  the  screen  stars,  and — 
Oh  dear!  if  we  only  had  our  autograft  albums  with  us.  You 
got  no  photografts  with  you,  have  you?" 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  55 

The  other  girl  broke  in  jealously:  "O*  course  he  hasn't. 
What  you  think  he  is,  a  freak  in  a  muzhum?  But  couldn't 
you,  wouldn't  you  send  us  one  apiece?  I'll  give  you  the 
address  if  you'll  lemme  a  pensul." 

Tom  was  indomitably  polite,  and,  besides,  it  was  bad 
business  to  snub  an  admirer.  He  was  actually  about  to 
write  their  addresses  in  his  notebook,  when  the  conductor's 
long  far  call,  "All  aboard!"  gave  Robina  an  excuse  to  drag 
him  away  from  the  worshipers. 

One  of  the  girls  groaned,  "He  got  away,  darn  it!" 

The  other,  in  an  epilepsy  of  agitation,  wailed:  "Say, 
looky!  That  lady  under  the  veil  is  Robina  Teele!  Gee! 
and  we  didn't  reco'nize  her!" 

Thus  the  Greeks  were  also  stricken  with  a  panic  of  rever 
ence  when  the  gods  came  down  to  earth. 

But  Mem  did  not  know  or  worship  these  gods.  She  had 
only  a  vague  impression  of  what  was  going  on  as  she  snatched 
at  the  last  of  her  available  coins  and  ran  to  the  train.  The 
porter  had  already  put  up  his  little  box  step. 

The  loss  of  any  petty  sum  meant  a  privation,  but  her 
regret  was  swallowed  in  her  vivid  realization  of  what  it 
would  have  meant  to  be  left  there  in  that  town. 

She  was  panting  hard  with  fright  when  she  sank  into  her 
place,  and  the  train  was  emerging  from  the  retreating  walls 
of  the  city  before  she  felt  calm  enough  to  examine  her 
magazines. 

On  the  cover  of  one  of  them  was  a  huge  head  of  Robina 
Teele,  all  eyes  and  curls  and  an  incredibly  luscious  mouth. 
Remember  had  never  heard  of  her  or  seen  her  pictures,  be 
cause  her  films  were  great  "feature  specials,"  too  expensive 
for  the  villages. 

In  the  body  of  the  magazine  was  a  long  article  about  her, 
and  another  about  Tom  Holby. 

This  was  not  so  amazing  a  coincidence  as  it  seemed  to 
Mem,  for  both  Robina  Teele  and  Tom  Holby  had  press 
agents  who  would  have  been  chagrined  if  any  motion-picture 
periodical  had  appeared  without  some  blazon  of  their 
employers. 

Mem  stared  longest  at  the  various  pictures  of  Tom  Holby. 


56  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

She  found  him  in  all  manner  of  costumes  and  athletic  achieve 
ments,  and  she  read  the  rhapsody  on  him  first. 

Having  never  seen  a  moving  picture  of  anybody,  she  had 
never  seen  his.  She  had  never  seen  a  still  picture  of  him, 
either,  because  he  was  not  as  yet  important  enough  to  be 
starred,  and  only  such  greedy  pantheists  as  the  young  girls 
on  the  platform  were  as  yet  aware  of  him. 

Mem  was  dumfounded  to  realize  how  ignorant  she  was. 
Here  were  people  so  important  that  people  stared  at  them 
and  begged  for  their  pictures,  while  magazines  published 
glowing  tributes  to  them.  And  she  had  never  heard  of  them ! 

Now  that  she  saw  him  in  print,  her  heart  fairly  simmered 
with  the  thrill  of  her  encounter  with  him.  It  was  as  if  she 
had  knocked  the  hat  off  King  David  as  he  bent  to  pick  up 
her  harp  for  her.  She  forgot  for  a  long  while  that  she  was  a 
respectable  widow — of  a  very  poor  sort,  for  it  came  to  her 
in  an  avalanche  of  shame  that  she  was  neither  respectable 
nor  a  widow. 

But  she  was  a  fugitive  now  from  her  past  and  from  such 
thoughts,  and  she  caught  up  the  magazines  with  a  desperate 
eagerness,  as  if  they  were  cups  of  nepenthe. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

DOCTOR  STEDDON  would  have  sent  up  a  new  kind 
of  prayer  if  he  could  have  seen  his  daughter  guzzling 
at  the  profane  literature  that  had  fallen  into  her  hands. 

The  first  of  the  magazines  was  devoted  to  articles  about 
the  famous  film  stars  and  their  families,  philosophies,  and 
fads.  Men  and  women,  some  of  whose  faces  had  stared  at 
her  from  the  billboards  of  Calverly,  were  presented  here  in 
mufti.  Here  was  a  dare-devil  cowboy  seated  on  the  porch 
of  a  gorgeous  home,  with  a  delicious  baby  in  his  arms. 
Here  were  beautiful  leading  men  smoking  pipes  and  reading 
books  or  cuddling  dogs.  Here  were  women  of  all  types, 
many  of  them  evidently  wealthy  and  all  of  them  intensely 
domestic. 

It  was  surprising  how  many  of  the  prettiest  of  them  were 
dandling  babies.  Womanlike,  Mem  cooed  and  gurgled  at 
the  fat  babies.  One  of  them  sent  a  wonderful  sweet  pang 
through  her  heart.  For  the  first  time  she  felt  a  welcome  and 
a  love  for  the  mysterious  visitor  whose  secret  couriers  had 
caused  her  such  a  frenzy  of  terror. 

For  the  first  time  her  soul  yearned  within  her,  and  her 
curiosity  to  see  what  her  child  would  look  like  and  be  like 
overcame  every  other  feeling.  She  had  hoped  to  die.  Now 
she  wanted  to  live  to  solve  this  mystery  story  in  nine  install 
ments.  She  felt  for  the  first  time  pride  in  her  amazing  power. 

She  read  every  word  of  the  first  magazine,  including  the 
advertisements.  Then  a  white-aproned  waiter  marched 
through  the  car,  crying:  "Fir  scall  flunch  in  dinin'  caw. 
Firs  scall  flunch  dine  caw." 

The  trek  to  the  dining  car  was  another  new  experience. 
The  prices  were  terrifying,  but  the  new  dishes  were  educa 
tional.  She  chose  the  cheapest,  but  they  were  spiced  with 
the  sauce  of  novelty.  She  had  never  eaten  at  sixty  miles  an 


58  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

hour.  It  was  strange  to  start  to  lift  your  fork  and  have  it 
reach  your  mouth  a  hundred  feet  away.  You  might  lift 
your  spoon  from  your  teacup  in  one  county  and  have  it 
reach  your  lips  in  another.  There  was  much  landscape 
between  the  cup  and  the  lip.  The  view  outside  her  dining 
room  at  home  had  never  changed  except  from  winter  to 
summer.  But  here  the  world  went  racing  past. 

The  man  opposite  her  was  unpleasantly  interested  in  her 
thoughts.  He  lacked  both  the  beauty  and  the  homage  of 
Mr.  Tom  Holby.  Her  animation,  the  restlessness  of  her 
eyes,  her  cheeks  swimming  with  color,  misled  him  into 
thinking  she  was  trying  to  strike  up  a  flirtation.  He  had  no 
appetite  for  a  flirtation  even  with  so  pretty  a  thing,  but  if 
she  wished  it  it  was  his  duty  to  play  the  game. 

Mem  could  not  understand  the  Samaritan  gallantry  of 
this.  She  hated  him  and  stared  at  the  scooting  scenery. 
Then  she  found  that  she  was  still  staring  at  the  man  since 
he  was  reflected  on  the  window.  Then  she  stared  at  her  food. 

She  lingered  longer  than  was  necessary  in  the  hope  that 
Mr.  Holby  and  Miss  Teele  would  visit  the  diner,  but  they 
did  not  appear. 

She  returned  to  her  car  and  took  up  the  second  magazine. 
This  was  also  devoted  to  the  screen  people,  but  it  was  more 
ambitious  artistically.  Some  of  the  pictures  were  in  colors, 
or  laid  on  tinted  backgrounds,  and  many  of  them  were  so 
audacious  that  Mem  felt  it  hardly  proper  for  her  to  look  at 
them  in  the  miscellaneous  company  of  the  sleeping  car. 
Of  course  it  was  her  duty  to  throw  the  accursed  thing  away ; 
but  then,  she  thought  with  profound  sorrow,  she  was  not 
doing  her  duty  much  nowadays. 

Being  an  abandoned  creature,  anyway,  she  abandoned 
herself  to  this  amazing  repository  of  intimacies.  Being  a 
preacher's  daughter,  she  also  told  herself  that  if  she  threw  it 
away  it  might  fall  into  the  hands  of  people  it  would  do  more 
harm  to. 

Here  were  women  of  opulent  beauty  in  tremendous  hats, 
with  Niagaral  plumes,  in  skirts  voluminous  enough  to  con 
ceal  a  family.  There  were  others  with  almost  nothing  on  at 
all.  Some  of  these  had  a  perfection  of  figure  of  which  they 


SOULS   FOR   SALE  59 

submitted  all  the  evidence.  Some  of  them  rejoiced  in  pos 
tures  as  extravagant  as  their  costumes  were  parsimonious. 
Some  of  them  had  clutched  a  few  furs  or  silks  about  them 
just  barely  in  time,  and  looked  so  startled  and  so  shy  that 
Mem  wondered  why  they  had  permitted  the  pictures  to  be 
published  at  all.  She  had  not  yet  learned  how  much  a 
baby  stare  conceals.  She  had  not  learned  that  she  her 
self,  for  all  her  experience,  looked  at  the  world  with  a  baby 
stare. 

There  were  a  few  portraits  of  men  even  more  garbless, 
foreign  dancers  and  Americans  in  barbaric  decorations. 
There  was  an  article  about  a  Cubist  painter  whose  mad 
paintings  made  Mem's  head  ache.  There  was  an  article 
about  a  titled  Englishman  of  fame  who  was  going  to  write 
moving  pictures. 

There  was  a  bevy  of  contestants  for  a  beauty  prize,  the 
winner  to  be  given  a  position  in  a  movie  studio.  These  girls 
came  from  all  over  the  country;  they  hailed  from  villages, 
small  towns,  and  the  obscurer  regions  of  big  cities.  They 
were  labeled  as  "Miss  X,  stenographer;  Miss  Z,  shopgirl; 
Miss  Y,  home  girl";  and  so  on. 

They  had  tricked  themselves  out  in  makeshift  splendor, 
posed  themselves  in  mimicry  of  famous  stars,  their  hair 
down,  their  eyes  up,  their  hands  and  feet  draped  in  what 
they  thought  artistic  poses.  Some  of  them  were  very  pretty 
and  all  of  them  ambitious  to  sway  the  world  ^and  garner 
wealth. 

Wearied  a  little  by  the  hubbub  of  beauty  and  its  advertise 
ment,  Mem  put  the  two  magazines  aside.  They  seemed  to 
be  hot  with  curious  flames  that  strangely  did  not  shrivel  the 
paper.  The  people  who  were  celebrated  there  by  name  and 
face  and  figure  must,  if  there  were  any  truth  in  her  father's 
faith,  be  lost  souls,  damned  to  blister  in  their  unshriveling 
skins  forever.  But  how  little  they  must  know  of  their  des 
tinies  !  Or,  if  they  knew,  how  little  they  cared !  How  sleek 
and  passionate  and  glad  they  were,  and  how  richly  clothed ! — 
richly  unclothed,  some  of  them;  for  the  least  attired  had  on 
the  most  jewels. 

Mem  glanced  down  at  her  own  shabby  skirt,  and  realized 


6o  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

for  the  first  time  what  a  little  Puritan  she  was — her  knees 
so  modestly  drawn  together,  her  elbows  clamped  in,  her 
hands  embracing  each  other  like  Babes  in  the  Wood,  her 
meek  head  bowed  a  little,  her  eyes  generally  lowered  except 
for  some  brief  dart  upward  as  if  she  stood  atiptoe  for  a 
moment. 

Suddenly  she  was  aware  of  her  flesh  in  a  way  almost 
unknown  before.  From  her  earliest  infancy  the  first  duty 
imposed  upon  her  had  been  modesty.  She  had  always  been 
pulling  down  her  skirts  and  up  her  bodice,  keeping  herself 
inconspicuous.  Even  her  loud  laughter  brought  down  the 
candle  snuffer  of  reproof. 

As  far  back  into  her  babyhood  as  she  could  recollect,  her 
mother  had  bathed  her  with  averted  gaze  and  kept  the  towels 
about  her.  Later,  when  she  had  attained  the  dignity  of 
being  too  big  to  be  seen  and  washed  by  her  own  mother, 
she  had  been  instructed  to  keep  herself  concealed  even  from 
her  own  eyes.  She  had  been  warned  that  God  was  every 
where;  His  sleepless  eyes  were  not  even  turned  away  in  a 
bathroom.  She  had  asked  her  mother  once: 

"Why  does  God  go  round  peeking  at  people  and  doing 
things  you  tell  me  are  not  nice  ?  Isn't  God  a  good  gentleman  ? ' ' 

Her  mother  had  been  properly  shocked  and  answered 
innocence  with  horror.  Mem  had  never  even  wondered  for  a 
moment  if  God  had  not  been  slightly  misrepresented.  It 
had  never  occurred  to  her  that  perhaps  his  poor,  half-witted 
worshipers  were  endowing  him  with  their  own  weak  intel 
lects,  slandering  him  with  their  stupid  reverence,  and  enforc 
ing  their  own  silly  prejudices  upon  souls  far  wiser,  though 
lacking  the  fearlessness  of  bigotry. 

As  a  result  of  her  reproved  curiosities,  Mem  hardly  knew 
herself.  Her  father  had  never  maintained  the  earlier  Chris 
tian  doctrine  that  to  bathe  at  all  was  a  heathen  abomination, 
a  pollution  of  the  soul  under  the  guise  of  cleansing  the 
loathsome  flesh.  Yet  bathing  in  the  Steddon  home  had 
been  a  rite  of  sanitation,  not  of  luxury;  a  godly  scrubbing, 
not  a  loitering  in  the  perfumed  depths  of  porcelain  tubs. 
God  had  made  perfume,  but  he  wanted  it  left  in  the  flowers 
to  die  and  stink  with  them.  And  perfume  was  expensive  as 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  61 

well  as  wicked.  Mem  had  been  able  to  afford  only  the  least 
costly  of  sins,  the  sin  that  the  poorest  can  pay  for. 

As  she  sat  staring  into  the  window,  the  landscape  leaping 
past  the  double  glass  with  its  own  glimmer  of  lights,  she 
tried  to  fancy  herself  like  one  of  those  twisted  girls  who 
admitted  the  public  to  a  bathroom  acquaintance.  She  tried 
to  imagine  herself  with  most  of  her  clothes  in  her  headdress, 
and  all  her  limbs  exploited  for  the  inspection  of  strangers, 
and  her  body  contorted  to  show  how  limber  it  was  and  how 
smoothly  round.  Her  fancy  could  not  make  the  distance. 

Yet  she  read  in  one  of  these  magazines  a  statement  that 
one  of  those  peculiar  women — this  very  Robina  Teele, 
indeed — was  being  paid  more  dollars  for  one  week's  pub 
licity  than  her  father  was  paid  for  four  years  of  saving  souls. 
The  press  agent  may  have  squandered  a  cipher  or  shifted 
the  decimal  point  a  little,  but  Mem  could  not  know  that, 
and  she  was  convinced  that  the  world  was  all  wrong  some 
where.  Plainly.  No  wonder  people  said  it  was  going  to 
perdition.  She  wondered  what  such  women  could  be  like — 
at  heart  and  at  home. 

As  she  glanced  through  the  pages  of  answers  to  cor 
respondents — and  how  countless  the  questioners  seemed  to 
be! — her  eye  caught  this  paragraph: 

MAME  L. — Yes,  dearie,  she  will  send  you  a  photograph  if  you 
will  send  her  25  cents.  Sorry  to  break  your  heart,  but  he  is  married. 
Tom  Holby  isn't,  though,  so  far  as  I  know.  How  much  he  gets  is 
his  own  secret  and  the  income-tax  collector's,  but  it  was  stated  that 
he  lately  refused  an  offer  of  a  thousand  a  week  to  desert  the  com 
pany  that  made  him  what  he  yam  to-day.  Such  loyalty  deserves 
a  posy. 

Mem  closed  the  magazine  with  a  gasp.  That  young  man 
refused  a  thousand  a  week!  and  her  father  had  never  had 
more  than  five  hundred  a  year.  And  her  father  saved  souls 
from  hell,  while  men  like  Holby  led  them  there  in  droves 
and  would  follow  in  God's  good  time. 

She  did  not  feel  any  impulse  to  rush  to  Tom  Holby  and 
warn  him  to  flee  from  his  doom.  She  simply  hated  him  for 
selling  his  soul  to  the  devil  at  such  a  price.  She  did  not  even 


62  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

admire  him  for  cheating  the  devil.  She  just  hated  him  and 
the  cat-eyed  Robina  and  all  this  Babylonian  horde  of  scarlet 
women. 

And  then  she  heard  a  voice  across  her  shoulder,  a  voice  of 
peculiar  and  unpleasant  softness.  She  had  read  somewhere 
of  a  velvet  voice.  This  one  was  of  plush. 

She  felt  uneasy  before  she  turned  her  head  and  almost 
bumped  noses  with  the  woman  who  spoke.  At  this  close 
range  her  resemblance  to  a  doll  was  astounding;  the  eyes 
were  vast  and  glassy,  the  nose  a  pug,  the  mouth  full  and 
thick  with  paint,  the  face  smeared  white  and  red,  the  hair 
kinky  yellow,  as  if  it  were  made  of  hobby-horses'  tails. 

The  voice  of  imitation  velvet  repeated:  "What  I  was 
sayin'  was:  few've  finished  'th  that  magazine,  j'mind  fi  bor- 
ried  it  off  you?  I  'ain't  sor  that  nummba  yet." 

Mem  hardly  knew  how  to  answer  that  face  and  that  dia 
lect.  She  handed  the  magazine  up  over  the  back  of  the 
seat  with  a  smile  of  shy  generosity. 

The  animated  doll  remained  leaning  across  the  seat.  She 
must  be  kneeling  on  the  other  side.  As  she  skimmed  the 
magazine  rapidly  the  way  she  ran  her  eyes  up  each  page 
reminded  Mem  somehow  of  a  cat  licking  one  of  its  paws. 

As  the  girl  skimmed  picture  and  text,  she  talked  without 
looking  at  Mem : 

"  You're  on  the  way  to  Sanglus,  I  s'pose." 

"To  where?" 

"Lussanglus — chief  suburb  of  Hollywood.  Nearly  every 
body  in  this  strain  is  bound  furl  Sanglus." 

"Just  where  is  that?" 

"My  Gawd!  Is  there  anybody  on  earth  who  don't  know 
that  dump?  Or  maybe  you  call  it  Loss  Anjuleez.  No  two 
people  pernounce  it  alike." 

"Oh,  I  beg  your  pardon,  I  didn't  catch  the  name  at  first. 
No,  I'm  only  going  as  far  as  Tuckson." 

"Too-son,  eh.    You're  not  on  the  screen,  I  guess." 

"No-o,  no,  I'm  not." 

"It's  the  life! — leastways  it  was.  So  many  amachoors 
bein'  drord  into  it  now,  though,  it  ain't  what  it  was.  It's 
the  money  gets  'em  all.  Who  joo  s'pose  is  on  this  strain? " 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  63 

"I  can't  imagine." 

The  strange  creature  disappeared  and  came  round  to  sit 
down  opposite  Mem. 

"  Joo  mind  if  I  set  in  with  you  awhile?  You're  alone,  ain't 
you?  Or  is  your  husban'  up  smokin',  the  way  mine  always 
is?  As  I  says  to  Cyril  only  the  yother  day,' If  you'd  'a' 
gave  as  much  attention  to  your  rart  as  you  have  to  your 
tubbacca,  you'd  have  John  D.  workin'  for  you!'  I  says. 
'Better  to  smoke  here  than  hereafter/  he  says.  He's  awful 
speedy  with  the  subtitles,  that  boy.  I  don't  smoke,  m'self. 
Not  that  I  got  any  prejudices  against  it.  But  I  think  it 
takes  away  from  a  woman's  charm.  Don't  you?  No  offense 
intended.  Maybe  you  smoke,  yourself." 

Mem  wagged  her  head  in  a  daze.  She  would  have  been 
horrified  to  be  suspected  of  tobacco,  and  yet  since  this 
blatant  piece  of  ignorant  artifice  had  objections  to  it,  her 
inclination  grew  perverse. 

The  magazine  engaged  the  visitor's  attention  a  moment, 
and  Mem  studied  her  as  if  she  were  something  in  a  zoo. 
There  was  aggressive  impudence  in  the  very  way  she  sat — 
her  chin  high;  her  nostrils  aflare;  her  head  flaunted  now 
and  then  to  shake  away  her  curls  as  a  mare  tosses  her  mane 
aside;  her  shoulders  thrown  back;  her  bosom  uplifted;  her 
elbows  agog,  one  hand  set  with  fingers  dispread  on  an 
emphatic  hip;  legs  all  over  the  place,  and  the  skirt  so  short 
that  one  knee,  bared  by  its  rolled-down  stocking,  was 
manifest. 

Mem  was  almost  petrified  to  observe  that  the  kneecap 
was  powdered  and  rouged! 

Yet  she  could  not  help  noting  also  that  it  was  exquisitely 
modeled,  and  the  calves  as  delicately  lathed  as  a  Chippendale 
spindle.  There  was  refinement  in  all  the  creature's  outlines, 
yet  hopeless  spiritual  coarseness.  The  conflict  jarred  on 
Mem,  who  had  taken  as  little  thought  of  aesthetic  mysteries 
as  any  pretty  girl  could,  and  live  as  long  as  she  had  lived. 

Abruptly  the  perfectly  modeled  minx  shattered  Mem's 
calm  with  the  first  curse  she  had  ever  heard  a  woman  use. 

"Well,  I'm  damned!  Would  ja  see  what  they  done  to 
me!" 


64  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

She  whirled  herself  round  and  plounced  down  at  Merris 
side  in  a  cyclone  of  perfumery.  She  pointed  to  the  open  page 
where  there  was  a  picture  that  had  slapped  Mem  in  the  face. 
A  young  man  clad  in  a  leopard's  pelt  and  nothing  else  danced 
while  he  held  aloft  like  a  cane  the  horizontal  figure  of  a  girl 
similarly  revealed  and  concealed.  She  was  flung  backward, 
broken  at  the  waist,  a  mass  of  hai~  flowing  down  from  her 
reverted  head;  and  she  was  pitifully  beautiful.  The  name 
under  the  picture  was  Viva  d'Artoise. 

"That's  me,  Veva  Dartoys — stage  name,  o'  course.  They 
used  that  old  pitcher  of  me  with  my  first  husban'!  The 
nerve  of  'em!  I  ought  to  soo  'em  for  slander.  It's  three 
years  old.  Them  leopard  skins  is  all  out  of  style.  They 
done  that  to  me  just  to  save  makin*  a  noo  cut.  Gawd!  I 
hope  Cyril  don't  see  it.  He's  so  sensatuv.  I'll  show  you 
one  of  my  latest." 

And  while  Mem's  soul  was  joggled  as  if  the  train  had  left 
the  rails  to  run  along  the  ties,  the  girl  had  left  her  and 
returned,  carrying  a  sheaf  of  photographs,  which  she  dis 
played  with  a  frankness  that  shattered  Mem's  calm. 

In  some  of  them  she  was  as  fragile  and  poetical  as  if  she 
had  capered  off  the  side  of  a  Greek  vase  by  Douris  himself. 
In  others  her  beauty  was  petulant  and  deprecatory,  shy  and 
inexpressibly  pure.  Again  she  was  an  acrobat  reckless  of 
consequences.  There  were  pictures  of  her  husband  and 
herself,  her  husband  looking  as  much  like  a  young  Greek 
god  as  possible,  holding  her  in  the  air  as  high  as  possible. 
And  each  permitted  the  other  to  be  seen  in  public  like 
that! 

Mem  was  so  shaken  that  she  could  find  nothing  at  all  to 
say.  She  regained  speech  only  when  Mademoiselle  d'Artoise 
brought  out  some  scenes  taken  on  the  steps  of  her  home — a 
charming  little  Spanish  bungalow,  with  her  husband  mowing 
the  lawn  and  her  ancient  mother  smiling  from  the  porch. 
In  all  these  pictures  Mademoiselle  Viva  held  a  baby,  an 
adorable  chubby  thing  that  restored  Mem  to  civilization  as 
she  understood  it. 

The  mother  explained:  "I  hadda  leave  him  for  a  dash  to 
N'York.  I  and  m'usband  hadda  play  a  coupla  dancers  at  a 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  65 

swell  reception — for  the  movies,  o'  course.    And  they  hadda 
shoot  us  on  Fith  Avenyeh  to  get  local  color." 

"They  shot  you  for  local  color !    Where ? " 

"On  Fith  Avenyeh.  We  been  shot  all  over  the  place. 
We  used  to  be  in  vawdvul,  but  we  drifted  into  doin'  spec 
taculars  for  the  movies  in  the  big  perductions.  It's  the  life! 
Hadn't  you  ever  thought  of  takin'  a  shy  at  it  ? " 

Mem  shook  her  head.  Mademoiselle  Viva  smiled.  ' '  Come 
on  in;  the  water's  fine.  With  your  face  and  figger,  there's 
nothin'  to  it." 

Mem  shuddered.  Her  figure  was  her  own  for  only  a  little 
while  longer.  The  Eden  of  the  movies  was  not  for  her. 

Viva  was  willing  to  gossip  as  long  as  anyone  was  willing 
to  listen.  She  admitted  this  herself  with  the  frank  helpless 
ness  of  a  garrulous  soul. 

"Cyril's  always  savin'  I  never  stop.  I'm  what  he  hears 
talkin'  when  he  falls  asleep,  and  the  first  thing  he  hears  in 
the  mornin'  is  me  talkin'.  Sometimes  he  says,  'Are  you 
talkin'  again  or  yet?" 

But  Mem  was  an  insatiable  audience.  Her  information 
was  a  Sahara  and  no  amount  of  rain  could  be  too  much. 

All  afternoon  Viva  chattered,  giving  Mem  a  liberal  educa 
tion  in  one  of  the  countless  phases  of  moving-picture  life,  a 
foreign  world,  another  planet  where  everything  was  unlike 
anything  she  had  ever  imagined,  where  the  very  laws  of 
social  gravity  were  reversed.  She  was  getting  an  altogether 
twisted  idea  of  it  all.  Her  guide  was  as  trustworthy  as  a 
Peruvian  Indian  trying  to  describe  the  heroic  wonders  of  the 
lost  city  of  Machu  Picchu.  Mem's  knowledge  of  Italy  was 
gained  from  a  banana  and  fruit  peddler  in  Calverly.  Her 
introduction  to  Movia  was  like  that  of  one  who  enters 
Stamboul  by  railroad  through  the  back  yards  of  Constanti 
nople.  What  she  heard  gave  her  no  curiosity  to  see  more, 
and  an  assurance  that  her  dear  old  father  had  made  a  good 
guess  at  Los  Angeles. 


CHAPTER  IX 

VIVA  was  still  talking  when  the  waiter  came  through 
again  with  his  proclamation:    "Fir  scall  fr  dinner  'n 
dine  caw!    Fir  scall  fr  din  dine  caw!" 

There  was  a  scurry  among  the  passengers  and  Mem  was 
eager  to  go,  but  Viva  could  not  break  off  the  story  she  was 
telling.  Suddenly  she  stopped,  stared,  seized  Mem's  arm, 
and  whispered,  "Pipe  what's  comin'!" 

Mem  piped  a  dramatic  woman  of  singularly  noble  face 
and  figure  and  somewhat  grandiose  carriage.  Following  her 
was  an  elegant  gentleman  of  a  certain  exoticism,  a  bit  peevish 
over  the  bad  manners  the  train  displayed  in  tossing  him  to 
and  fro. 

"Joo  know  who  that  is?"  Viva  whispered,  and  did  not 
stay  for  an  answer.  "That  dame  is  the  great  Miriam  Yore. 
She's  been  the  grand  slam  at  the  Mettapolitan  Op'ra  for  years. 
And  the  flossy  guy  with  her  is  that  big  English  author, 
What's-his-name.  You  know,  he  wrote — oh,  all  them  books. 

"They're  bound  for  Movieland,  too.  Everybody's  makin' 
that  way.  The  comp'tition  is  somethin'  fierce." 

Her  voice  died  as  the  two  drifted  down  the  aisle,  pausing 
to  talk  in  snatches,  between  dashes  for  the  next  leaning  post. 

As  the  train  swung  the  great  Miriam  half  across  Mem's 
seat  the  author  was  saying: 
"Everybody  tells  me  that  Los  Angeles  is  absolutely — " 

Then  they  were  gone,  reawakening  in  Mem  her  desire  to 
learn  just  what  this  fabulous  city  could  be  absolutely. 

The  return  of  Viva's  husband  released  her  to  her  own 
thoughts  for  the  rest  of  the  evening.  Viva  introduced  the 
partner  of  her  fate  and  her  dances,  and  hurried  away  to  the 
women's  room  to  "worsh  up  for  the  eats." 

Her  husband  said  a  few  amiable  nothings  to  Mem,  but 
she  was  afraid  to  look  at  him.  He,  Cyril  (ne  Julius),  was 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  67 

ordinary  enough  in  speech  and  appearance,  but  Mem  could 
only  see  him  as  the  panther-pelted  satyr  who  took  the  public 
absolutely  into  his  confidence  and  swung  his  half-stripped 
wife  aloft  for  all  the  world  to  see. 

After  dinner  Mem  found  her  way  to  the  observation  car 
and  sat  on  the  platform  awhile,  watching  the  dark  world  of 
her  past  fleeing  backward  to  the  horizon  and  vanishing  thence 
into  the  stars. 

But  her  interests  were  no  longer  backward.  She  wanted 
to  look  ahead.  She  rose  from  the  contemplation  of  night 
and  re-entered  the  car. 

Noting  that  the  writing  desk  was  not  in  use,  she  was 
reminded  of  her  task.  She  sat  down  and  began  a  letter 
home.  Her  heart,  weary  with  the  day's  excursions,  melted 
again  toward  her  mother  and  father.  She  wrote  them  a 
prattle  of  childish  enthusiasm  about  the  journey.  She  did 
not  mention  Viva  or  the  others.  She  was  afraid  they  would 
frighten  her  parents  as  much  as  they  had  frightened  her,  and 
not  so  agreeably. 

She  had  finished  her  letter  and  was  sealing  it  when  she 
suddenly  remembered  Doctor  Bretherick's  prescription. 
She  was  to  take  a  lover  on  the  first  day !  The  very  name  of 
the  figment  of  Bretherick's  mania  had  been  crowded  out  of 
her  mind  by  these  curious,  unbelievable  people  who  actually 
moved  and  breathed.  After  a  little  groping,  she  recalled 
Woodbury,  then  Woodhouse,  then  Woodville.  She  took  up 
the  painful  composition  of  a  postscript  with  all  the  agony 
of  an  author  trying  to  recall  and  to  originate  at  the  same  time. 

She  had  mentioned  nobody  that  she  had  met.  Now  she 
must  describe  the  important  man  that  she  would  never  meet. 
He  was  an  imaginary,  and  therefore  a  quite  perfect,  charac 
ter.  She  finally  wrote: 

Oh,  I  forgot!  Who  do  you  suppose  I  ran  into  on  the  train? 
You'd  never  guess  in  a  million  years.  You  know  when  I  went  to 
Carthage  to  take  care  of  Aunt  Mabel?  Well,  do  you  remember  me 
telling  you  about  the  awfully  nice  man  I  met  at  church?  Mr. 
Woodville  was  his  name.  Remember?  Well,  would  you  believe  it, 
he  is  on  this  train!  Isn't  it  a  small  world!  He  has  been  most  kind 
and  polite.  I  met  him  in  church,  as  you  remember,  and  somehow  I 


68  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

feel  much  safer  not  being  alone.  I'm  sure  you'll  be  glad.  He's 
very  religious,  but  awfully  nice — I  mean,  so,  of  course,  awfully 
nice.  Good  night  again  you  darlings! 

Being  told  that  they  recollected  Mr.  Woodville,  her  parents 
obligingly  remembered  him.  Mrs.  Steddon  had  been  warned 
of  this  fiction  and  collaborated  in  it.  Doctor  Steddon  was 
one  of  those  who  believe  almost  anything  they  read,  es 
pecially  when  they  hope  for  its  truth.  And  there  was 
nothing  he  hoped  for  so  much  as  that  his  child  should  meet 
a  good  man  and  love  him  and  be  loved  by  him.  That  is  the 
parental  ideal,  and  Mem  could  have  sent  him  no  other  mes 
sage  that  could  have  so  comforted  him.  He  awaited  the 
second  installment  of  her  romance  with  all  the  impatience 
of  a  country  man  watching  for  the  stagecoach  that  brought 
along  Charles  Dickens's  serials  piecemeal. 

He  knew  nothing  of  the  wiles  of  story  makers  and  did  not 
suspect  the  trap  his  child  was  laying  for  him.  Her  name 
should  have  been  Sapphira. 


CHAPTER  X 

AFTER  she  had  finished  her  letter  and  sealed  it,  Mem 
paused,  wondering  what  to  do  with  it. 

She  was  in  an  agony  of  reluctance  to  send  such  a  pack  of 
lies  to  her  mother  and  father.  She  recalled  the  Biblical 
warning  against  doing  evil  that  good  might  come  of  it. 
But  she  dared  not  face  the  evil  that  would  certainly  come  if 
the  truth  were  told. 

As  she  sat  irresolute,  beating  the  envelope  against  the  tip 
of  her  fingers,  she  saw  Miss  Miriam  Yore  come  into  the 
observation  car  and  pass  on  out  to  the  platform.  She  was 
followed  by  the  famous  unknown  author.  They  were  both 
talking  as  before,  and  the  motion  of  the  car  threw  them  this 
way  and  that  without  checking  their  prattle. 

Mem  was  hungry  to  hear  how  great  people  talked,  to 
watch  them  behaving.  She  had  never  seen  any  before. 

She  saw  the  porter  of  the  observation  car  grinning  in 
front  of  her  foggily.  He  spoke  twice  before  she  heard  back 
what  he  had  said. 

"Want  me  to  mail  yo'  letta,  lady,  at  next  stop?" 

She  nodded  and  gave  it  to  him  with  a  warm,  "  Thank 
you."  He  would  have  much  preferred  a  cold  quarter. 

Mem  saw  that  the  platform  was  not  crowded.  So  she 
drifted  out  with  labored  casualness  and  cat  down,  pretending 
to  study  the  scenery  and  to  be  quite  deaf.  Practice  was 
making  her  a  zealous  actress,  if  not  a  good  one. 

The  author  was  just  offering  Miriam  Yore  a  cigarette. 

"Thanks,  old  thing,  I  don't  dare.  I've  smoked  myself 
blue  in  the  face  to-day.  I've  got  to  fill  my  lungs  with  fresh 
air  while  the  porter  makes  up  my  drawing-room,  or  I  won't 
sleep. 

"As  I  was  saying,  I  think  you're  quite  wrong  about  the 
moving  pictures.  Of  course,  most  of  those  that  have  been 


70  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

done  are  abominable,  but  that's  because  they  were  done  for 
the  wrong  people  by  the  wrong  people. 

"Have  you  seen  me  as  'Hypatia'?  There  was  a  picture! 
Poetry,  passion,  splendor,  drama.  In  that  scene  where  the 
Christian  fanatics  drove  the  wonderful  Hypatia  to  the  altar 
and  stripped  her  naked  and  tore  her  to  pieces — it  was  tre 
mendous,  you  know;  really!  There  was  something  there 
that  only  the  camera  could  give.  You  didn't  see  me  in  that  ? ' ' 

She  was  a  genuine  "  Have-you-seen-me  ? " — just  what  the 
French  call  a  "m'as-tu-vu?" 

"No,  I  must  confess.  I  go  so  seldom.  In  England  I  saw 
mainly  the  cowboy  pictures.  I  met  some  of  the  men  of  the 
10 1  Ranch  when  they  were  on  the  other  side." 

Mem  noted  that  he  said  "rahnch." 

It  must  be  glorious  to  say  it  naturally. 

He  went  on:  "I  love  the  cowboy  things — nursery  in 
stincts  still  surviving,  I  fancy.  But  the  big  spectacles  such 
as  you  speak  of,  they  leave  me  cold.  They  have  all  the 
faults  of  grand  opera  and  no  music.  I  can  stand  the  silent 
drama,  but  not  the  silent  opera." 

"But  what  right  have  you  to  criticize  if  you  haven't 
seen?" 

"Oh,  but  my  d'yah  Miriam,  if  they  had  been  worth  seeing 
I'd  have  been  drawn  to  them." 

"Rot,  my  dear!  utter  damned  rot,  and  you  know  it.  You 
are  the  type  of  literary  buzzard  who  is  never  drawn  to  any 
thing  except  what  is  dead  or  is  done  in  a  dead  style  according 
to  dead  rules.  You  live  in  a  time  when  a  new  art  is  being 
created  before  your  eyes,  and  instead  of  leaping  into  it  you 
are  afraid,  you  hang  back,  like  a  child  afraid  of  the  ocean. 
You  put  in  a  toe  and  run  shrieking;  you  go  back,  and  a 
little  wave  rushes  up  to  the  seat  of  your  little  panties,  and 
chills  you;  you  feel  the  sand  giving  way,  and  scream  for 
nursie  to  come  drag  you  out. 

"Why  don't  you  plunge  in  and  learn  to  swim;  face  the 
breakers;  if  you  can't  rise  over  them,  dive  under  them. 
What  are  you  afraid  of?  If  the  moving-picture  people  are 
as  stupid  as  you  think  they  are,  how  easily  they  can  be- 
conquered  by  as  great  a  mind  as  you  think  you  are." 


SOULS   FOR   SALE  71 

The  author  squirmed.  ''Oh,  I  say,  my  dear  Miriam, 
aren't  you  laying  it  on  a  big  strong?  Aren't  I  on  the  train, 
going  out  to  study  your  ocean ?  I  want  to  swim.  I'm  going 
to  try.  Really!" 

"That's  better.  It's  a  far  better  thing  than  you've  ever 
done.  You'll  see.  You've  written  good  novels,  stories, 
plays,  essays,  poems — all  sorts  of  things;  but  men  have 
done  those  for  thousands  of  years.  When  you  write  a  movie 
you  do  what  no  man  ever  did  before  this  generation.  And 
look  at  me.  I've  played  plays,  I've  sung  light  operas  and 
grand  operas,  and  danced  a  little,  but,  good  Lord!  women 
have  done  those  things  for  ages.  In  the  moving  picture  I'm 
doing  something  that  no  woman  before  my  generation  ever 
did. 

"We  are  the  pioneers,  the  Argonauts,  the  discoverers.  We 
shall  be  classics  as  sure  as  ever  classics  were.  It's  glorious!" 

The  author  was  a  trifle  jealous  of  such  fine  writing  from  a 
singer  and  an  actress.  He  tried  to  put  her  in  her  place : 

"I  see  what  you're  driving  at.  In  fact,  I've  written  much 
the  same  thing  and  said  it  to  interviewers,  who  got  it  all 
wrong,  of  course — interferers,  I  call  them.  But  what  good 
did  it  do  me  ?  I  was  merely  accused  of  trying  to  whitewash 
myself  for  going  after  big  money.  Of  course  I  want  the  big 
money.  I  insist  on  it,  or  I  should  if  they  refused  it.  Which 
they  don't.  Quite  the  contr'ry.  But  what  I  mean  to  say,  is: 

"  If  I  go  in  for  moving  pictures  I  shall  not  try  to  do  any  of 
your  grandiose  things.  They're  all  right  in  their  place,  but 
I  think  there's  more  art  in  the  smaller  forms.  I  want  to  do 
something  smart,  satirical,  the  high-comedy  thing.  The 
pictures  seem  to  me  to  need  the  aristocratic  touch  more 
than  anything  else." 

Miss  Yore  yawned.  ' '  Beware  of  the  aristocratic  touch,  my 
dear.  It  means  boredom  most  of  the  time.  I  know  no  end 
of  aristocrats  who  are  interesting,  but  that's  because  they 
are  soldiers  or  statesmen,  big-game  hunters,  adventurers. 
But  your  deadly  drawing-rooms — keep  those  off  the  screen 
or  you'll  bankrupt  your  backers." 

The  author  yawned.  "Speaking  of  bankrupting  your 
backers,  old  dear,  I  hear  that  you  are  doing  your  best  to 


72  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

accomplish  that.  I  was  told  by  a  man  who  claimed  to  know, 
that  you  are  getting  ten  thousand  a  week.  Is  it  true?" 

Miriam  rose  and  smacked  his  cheek  lightly. 

"Are  you  jealous?" 

"Yes,  I  am,  rather.  They're  only  giving  me  twenty-five 
thousand  for  my  new  piece.  They  said  they  couldn't  pay 
me  more  because  you  stars  were  such — well,  the  word  they 
used  was,  hogs.  It's  a  shame  to  pauperize  me  to  fatten  you." 

"Fatten?  Don't  use  the  hideous  word !  If  you  knew  the 
agonies  I  go  through  to  keep  my  flesh  down.  All  this  money 
and  all  this  glory,  and  I'm  hungry  all  the  time." 

She  paused  by  the  brass  rail  and  gazed  about  the  dark 
levels  that  seemed  rather  to  revolve  slowly  about  the  train 
than  to  be  left  behind.  And  she  sighed: 

"Strange  place  this  little  old  world!  I  was  born  on  a 
prairie  like  this — in  a  small  town  like  the  one  we  just  rattled 
through.  I  was  a  poor  daughter  of  poor  parents.  Dad  kept 
a  drug  store — a  chemist's  shop  as  you'd  say.  And  now — 
well,  I've  sung  before  kings  and  queens;  I've  had  princes 
make  love  to  me  more  or  less  pitifully;  I've  had  diamonds 
from  dukes.  I  was  engaged  to  a  duke  once — you  may  have 
read  or  heard  that  idiotic  story  that  I  can't  kill — about  the 
two  children  I  had  by  the  Duke  of —  Why,  I  never  was 
alone  with  the  man!  But,  anyway,  I've  had  those  scandals 
and  splendors,  and  now  I'm  going  back  at  a  salary  that — 
Why,  I  could  buy  out  most  of  the  dukes  I've  met!  And  I 
get  it  all  for  pretending  to  suffer  imaginary  woes  in  imaginary 
situations. 

"And  you — you  were  the  son  of  a  rusty  little  Oxford  don, 
and  you're  complaining  because  you  get  only  five  thousand 
pounds  for  the  moving-picture  rights  of  a  silly  fairy  story 
you  spin  in  a  few  months.  It's  a  drunken  old  world  and  we 
ought  to  be  ashamed  of  ourselves  for  stealing  its  money." 

"But  I  have  to  give  the  British  government  fifty- three 
per  cent  of  all  I  get,"  he  wailed. 

11  The  U.  S.  income  tax  murders  me,  too,"  she  sighed. 

She  slipped  through  the  door  like  her  own  La  Tosca. 
The  author  laughed  a  dreary  "Good  night! "  stood  a  moment 
finishing  his  cigarette  and  studying  out  of  the  corner  of  his 


SOULS    FOR   SALE  73 

eye  the  mute,  meek  auditor  whom  they  had  perhaps  for 
gotten;  perhaps  had  been  playing  to  all  the  time. 

He  wondered  if  Mem  knew  who  he  was.  She  had  not 
heard  his  name,  and  would  not  have  recognized  it  if  she  had. 

He  felt  like  talking  a  lot  about  himself  to  somebody.  But 
he  was  Englishly  shy  of  broaching  conversations;  he  was 
himself  a  tight  little  isle  with  a  gift  for  spreading  his  power 
around  the  world  and  making  people  think  that  his  loneliness 
and  timorousness  and  lack  of  savoir  vivre  were  reserve. 

The  unknown  and  unknowing  Mem  was  afraid  that  he 
was  going  to  speak  to  her.  But  he  did  not  dare.  He  flicked 
his  cigarette  overboard  majestically  and  made  a  good  exit. 
Then  he  crept  away  to  his  lonely  drawing-room  and  shud 
dered  at  the  prospect  of  entering  the  new  world  with  its  new 
people,  a  world  of  bounders,  as  he  had  been  told. 

He  left  Mem  dizzy  with  what  she  had  overheard.  The 
contrast  between  Viva  and  Miriam  Yore  was  complete. 
The  moving-picture  planet  was  plainly  one  of  enormous  size 
and  variety. 

But  the  wickedest  thing  about  it  in  her  eyes  was  the 
money  it  squandered. 

The  richest  banker  in  Calverly  was  a  pauper  compared 
with  the  woman  who  had  just  left  the  platform.  And  all  she 
did  was  to  stand  up  and  have  her  picture  taken.  Mem  had 
never  heard  of  Hypatia,  and  she  did  not  believe  that  any 
such  thing  had  happened  as  Miriam  Yore  described.  She 
did  not  know  that  the  moving  picture  had  been  taken  from  a 
historical  novel  written  by  a  clergyman.  Neither  did  the 
clergyman,  probably,  as  he  had  been  dead  for  a  quarter  of  a 
century  before  the  pictures  were  taught  to  move. 

All  that  Mem  knew  of  the  Rev.  Charles  Kingsley's  works 
was  The  Water  Babies  and  a  poem  from  which  her  father  was 
always  quoting,  "Be  good,  sweet  maid,  and  let  who  will  be 
clever." 

Mem  was  not  clever,  and  everybody  knew  it.  Yet  she 
had  not  been  good,  and  only  two  people  knew  it. 

Not  having  been  good,  she  just  had  to  be  clever. 


CHAPTER  XI 

ROWN  suddenly  afraid  of  the  night-shrouded  plains 
and  the  loneliness  of  the  deserted  platform,  Mem 
returned  to  the  lights.  Through  car  after  car  she  pushed, 
seeking  her  own.  She  had  not  kept  count  of  its  number. 
Each  car  was  now  a  narrow  alley  of  curtains. 

She  was  lost  on  a  madly  racing  comet  made  up  of  bed 
rooms  and  corridors  where  men  in  their  underclothes  climbed 
ladders  or  sat  on  the  edges  of  their  beds,  yawning  and 
undressing.  Tousled  heads  leered  at  her  from  upper  berths 
or  from  cubbyholes.  She  had  to  squeeze  past  men  and 
women  in  bathrobes  straggling  down  the  halls. 

She  was  frightened.  She  had  never  believed  such  scenes 
possible.  She  was  panic-stricken  at  being  unable  to  find  her 
own  hiding  place.  Her  porter  was  not  to  be  found.  At  last 
she  met  Viva  coming  out  of  a  wash  room,  dressed  as  if  some 
one  had  yelled  "Fire."  Mem  felt  positively  fond  of  her;  a 
friend  in  need  is  a  friend  indeed. 

Viva  wore  a  gaudy  kimono  and  kept  it  close  about  her 
with  a  modesty  surprising  in  view  of  her  photographs. 
Mem  had  not  learned  that  artists  of  Viva's  field  are  no  less 
prudish  in  private  for  being  so  shameless  in  public.  There's 
safety  in  numbers. 

Mem  greeted  Viva  with  enthusiasm:  "Oh,  I'm  so  glad 
to  see  you!  This  must  be  my  car,  then." 

"Yes,  dear^ree,"  said  Viva.  "Was  you  lost?  Your 
number's  number  sev'm,  just  this  side  of  mine.  Too  bad 
you  didn't  take  a  section.  Some  big  hick  got  on  board 
whilst  you  was  away,  and  he's  asleep  up  in  your  attic  now. " 

This  was  disconcerting  indeed.  The  tenant  of  Mem's  sky 
parlor  had  left  a  pair  of  his  shoes  in  front  of  her  berth,  and 
his  clothes  were  visible  hanging  on  a  coat  hook. 

There  was  no  escape  for  the  girl.    She  had  to  clamber  into 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  75 

her  pigeonhole  and  make  the  best  of  it.  She  had  the  curious 
feeling  that  she  had  crawled  under  a  strange  man's  bed  to 
spend  the  night. 

Though  no  sane  burglar  would  ever  have  wasted  time  on 
a  village  minister's  house,  Mem  had  always  looked  under  her 
bed  for  one  before  she  kneeled  down  to  say  her  prayers. 
She  hoped  the  man  overhead  would  not  take  the  same 
precautions. 

And  how  was  she  to  kneel  down  and  say  her  prayers  in  that 
aisle?  In  the  berth  she  could  not  even  kneel  up.  This  was 
the  first  night  of  her  life  that  she  ever  omitted  that  genu 
flection.  She  had  to  pray  lying  down,  and  she  asked  the 
Lord  to  forgive  her  this  one  more  sin. 

She  had  asked  so  much  forgiveness  of  late!  She  wanted 
to  pray  also  that  her  letter  should  deceive  and  comfort  her 
father.  But  she  dared  not  ask  prosperity  for  a  lie.  She 
dared  not  ask  prosperity  for  the  series  of  lies  she  was  going 
to  tell.  Yet  her  thoughts  and  plans  must  be  known  Up 
There.  Yet  again,  if  they  were  known —  But  it  was 
growing  complicated  and  she  turned  her  thoughts  to  other 
things. 

Getting  out  of  her  clothes  and  into  her  nightgown  was  an 
experiment  in  contortion.  She  was  afraid  to  fall  asleep,  but 
there  was  a  drugging  monotony  in  the  muffled  click-clickety 
of  the  wheels  and  she  soon  knew  peace  and  a  much-needed 
oblivion. 

All  night  long  the  train  was  speeding  through  Kansas,  and 
the  next  morning  was  still  in  Kansas. 

Getting  dressed  was  another  appalling  experience  for  the 
girl,  and  she  peeked  through  her  curtains  to  see  what  the 
proper  costume  was  for  the  sprint  to  the  wash  room.  Viva 
was  not  there  to  help  her,  for  Viva  slept  late  and  her  section 
was  a  curtained  cabin  for  hours  after  the  rest  of  the  car  was 
made  up. 

The  scenery  was  flat  as  a  pancake,  but  there  was  no 
monotony  in  it  for  Mem.  Towns  and  farms  and  farms  and 
towns,  windmills  and  tree  clusters  and  barns  and  pigstys, 
were  all  wonderland  to  her.  And  dear,  brave  people  were 
making  their  homes  there. 


76  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

Setting  her  watch  back  an  hour  just  before  entering  the 
romantic  state  of  Oklahoma  was  in  itself  an  exciting  experi 
ence.  The  names  of  the  stations  were  literature,  poetry — 
Arkalon,  Liberal,  Guyman,  Texhoma,  Dalhart,  Middle- 
water,  Bravo,  Naravisa,  Tucumcari,  Los  Tanos,  Tularosa, 
Alamogordo,  Turquoise,  Grogrando,  El  Paso. 

She  lunched  in  Kansas,  crossed  Oklahoma  in  two  hours, 
entered  Texas,  dined  in  New  Mexico,  and  breakfasted  again 
in  Texas,  went  right  back  into  New  Mexico,  and  lunched  in 
Arizona. 

And  what  an  encyclopaedia  of  scenery  she  studied!  the 
endless  flats  of  Kansas,  with  its  broad  lazy  rivers  slouching 
along  their  flat  beds;  the  long  famine  of  trees  in  bald  levels, 
and  then  the  sudden  arrival  in  a  morbid,  fantastic  realm 
where  God  had  lost  his  temper  or  his  patience  or  something 
and  flung  everything  awry,  desert  and  vast  nightmares  of 
rock !  As  if  the  landscape  had  been  designed  by  one  of  those 
mad  cubists  she  had  read  about  the  day  before. 

But  everywhere  there  were  evidences  of  human  pluck; 
tireless  ants  fighting  the  Titans  for  control;  weak  men 
who  turn  chaos  to  order  and  tame  the  wild  regions  to 
dominion. 

The  scenery  was  such  a  book  of  adventure  that  Mem 
needed  no  other  diversion.  She  was  grateful  for  the  fact 
that  Viva  had  one  of  her  sick  headaches  and  did  little  talking. 
The  heat  and  dust  kept  the  great  Miriam  in  her  drawing- 
room,  and  Robina,  too.  She  saw  Tom  Holby  in  the  dining 
car  but  he  did  not  speak  to  her,  of  course,  because  she  did 
not  speak  to  him.  But  she  studied  him  slyly  when  he  was 
not  looking,  and  she  wondered  what  could  make  him  worth 
so  much  money.  She  had  not  learned  that  merchandise  is 
worth  just  what  it  will  bring  in  the  market,  whether  the 
merchandise  be  ships  or  shoes  or  sealing  wax,  souls  or  smiles 
or  tears. 

She  felt  for  this  handsome  youth  the  contempt  that 
women  feel  at  times  for  handsome  men.  She  felt  a  personal 
grudge  against  him  because  he  lived  and  prospered  and  won 
multitudinous  loves,  while  her  lover  lay  dead  in  oblivion. 
She  abominated  him  for  gaining  so  much  wealth  for  doing 


SOULS   FOR   SALE  77 

nothing  useful.  She  knew  too  little  of  life  as  yet  to  realize 
that  beauty  and  foolish  amusement  are  among  the  most 
useful  contributions  to  existence  and  are  not  overpaid. 

There  may  be  some  doubt  as  to  the  actual  benefits  and  the 
actual  efficiency  of  most  human  activities  and  inventions, 
including  the  countless  medicines,  religions,  political  expedi 
ents,  mechanisms  of  transportation,  and  other  elaborate 
devices  that  create  new  irritations  as  fast  as  new  conveni 
ences.  But  beauty  that  warms  the  heart  and  folly  that 
tickles  it  are  as  provedly  valuable  as  laughing  gas  and  other 
anaesthetics.  In  fact,  there  is  more  than  etymology  in  the 
kinship  between  aesthetics  and  anaesthetics,  and  both  have 
been  denounced  as  hellish  by  the  godly. 

Mem  spent  most  of  her  day  planning  her  second  letter 
home  and  growing  acquainted  with  that  husband  of  hers. 
She  used  Tom  Holby  as  a  model,  reluctantly,  yet  for  lack  of 
better  material. 

She  had  supposed  that  writing  fiction  must  be  as  easy  for 
its  manufacturers  as  spinning  webs  is  for  spiders.  But  con 
structing  character  was  exhausting  work  for  her — perhaps 
spiders  grow  weary,  too,  and  suffer  temperamental  strin 
gencies. 

She  learned  that  the  author  must  wrestle  with  the  invisible 
as  Jacob  with  the  angel,  and  that  the  angel  could  dislocate  a 
joint  at  a  touch. 

Mr.  Woodville  eluded  her  maddeningly,  and  her  sketch 
of  him  was  so  inconsistent  that  her  father,  when  he  received 
her  second  letter,  found  in  its  very  befuddlement  an  evidence 
that  she  was  losing  her  wits  over  the  fellow. 

Doctor  Steddon  was  pleasantly  alarmed.  Every  man  is 
afraid  of  every  man  who  interests  his  daughter.  Yet  he 
wants  some  man  to  capture  her. 

The  train  carried  Mem  deeper  and  deeper  into  the  soul 
of  Mr.  Woodville,  and  in  the  dark  hours  she  spent  in  her 
berth,  reclining  on  an  elbow  and  gazing  at  the  incredible 
landscape,  everything  unreal  grew  real,  and  her  mystic 
bridegroom  began  to  take  form  and  voice,  eyes  and  integrity. 

She  had  great  trouble  with  his  trade  or  profession.  This 
is  always  a  complication  with  authors.  Most  of  them  in 


73  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

despair  ignore  the  matter  entirely  or  give  the  character  some 
craft  vvith  elastic  office  hours  and  income. 

The  landscape  was  an  incessant  interruption.  Just  as  she 
was  about  to  settle  on  something  an  amazing  butte  would 
slide  past  her  window,  or  a  captivating  flat-roofed  adobe 
hovel  infested  with  little  human  cooties  of  Mexican  extrac 
tion  would  delight  her.  The  squalor  of  foreigners  is  always 
picturesque  and  it  is  typical  of  the  artistic  mind  to  find  more 
poetry  in  an  alien  garbage  heap  than  in  a  familiar  temple. 

The  desert  was  beautiful  to  this  girl  because  it  was  unusual. 
Its  cruelty  was  romantic,  since  she  had  not  encountered  its 
monotony. 

The  next  day  the  train  came  to  an  abrupt  halt.  A  driving 
bar  on  the  engine  had  broken  and  dropped;  it  had  torn  off 
the  ends  of  the  ties  for  hundreds  of  yards  before  its  drag  had 
been  noticed  by  the  engineer  and  the  engine  stopped.  If 
the  train  had  not  been  puffing  slowly  up  a  steep  grade  it 
would  have  been  derailed  and  sent  rolling  like  a  shot  snake; 
some  of  the  passengers  would  probably  have  been  mangled 
and  killed. 

It  was  a  long  while  before  the  passengers  found  this  out, 
and  they  reveled  in  the  delight  of  averted  disaster.  Mem 
thought  how  fitting  it  would  have  been  for  her  to  have 
suffered  a  death  so  closely  akin  to  El  wood's.  There  would 
have  been  an  artistic  grandeur  in  the  pattern  of  their  fates. 

And  yet  she  could  not  help  being  glad  to  be  alive.  She 
had  ridden  a  thousand  miles  and  more,  spiritually  as  well  as 
physically,  away  from  Calverly. 

Nobody  knew  how  long  the  train  would  be  delayed.  All 
were  like  people  on  a  ship  becalmed  in  midocean.  They 
could  not  go  on  until  a  new  engine  was  secured.  A  trainman 
had  to  walk  to  the  next  block  signal  tower,  miles  ahead,  and 
telegraph  back  for  another  locomotive. 

The  passengers  settled  down  to  hours  of  deferment,  cursing 
delay  and  comparing  it,  not  with  the  speed  of  the  pioneers 
who  agonized  across  the  wilderness,  but  with  the  velocity  of 
yesterday's  express. 

Viva  and  Mem  wandered  about,  looking  at  the  cactus 
and  the  sagebrush  and  deliciously  expecting  a  rattlesnake 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  79 

under  every  clump.  Viva  returned  to  the  car  and  to  sleep, 
but  Mem  strolled  farther  and  farther  away. 

She  saw  Tom  Holby  set  out  for  a  brisk  walk.  He  climbed 
a  ragged  butte  with  astonishing  agility,  winning  the  applause 
of  the  passengers.  He  had  the  knack  of  acquiring  applause. 

The  other  passengers  dawdled  about,  but  Mem  went 
farther  and  farther.  She  wanted  to  see  what  was  on  the 
other  side  of  that  butte  as  much  as  mankind  has  longed  to 
see  the  other  side  of  the  moon.  When  she  got  round  she 
found  that  the  other  side  was  much  like  the  other  side — 
more  desert,  more  buttes,  utter  dissimilarity,  yet  the  complete 
resemblance  of  chaos  to  chaos. 

When  she  started  back  the  cool  of  the  shadow  made  her 
rest  awhile.  The  heat  and  the  hypnosis  of  the  shimmering 
sand  sea  put  her  asleep  in  spite  of  herself.  She  woke  with  a 
start.  The  train  was  moving,  a  new  engine  dragging  it  and 
its  broken  engine.  She  ran,  fell,  picked  herself  up,  limped 
forward. 

She  was  alone  in  the  wilderness,  and  the  train  was  already 
a  toy  running  through  a  gap  between  two  lofty  buttes,  one  a 
grandiose  Tower  of  Babel;  the  other  a  deformed  and  crooked, 
writhen  diablerie.  Both  mocked  the  girl  unendurably  and 
she  stood  panting  in  a  suffocation  of  fright,  her  hands  pluck 
ing  at  each  other's  finger  nails.  Which  was  about  as  profit 
able  as  anything  else  they  could  have  found  to  do. 

Then  for  the  first  time  Mem  understood  what  the  desert 
meant  to  those  who  had  seen  the  last  burro  drop  and  found 
the  canteen  full  of  dry  air. 


CHAPTER  XII 

FOR  a  trance-while  Mem  made  a  perfect  allegory  of  help 
lessness  on  a  monument.  She  heard  a  voice  laughing, 
with  a  kind  of  querying  exclamation: 

"Hello?" 

The  word  was  as  unimportant  as  could  be  and  it  came 
from  what  she  had  just  decreed  the  most  useless  thing  on 
earth,  a  handsome  moving-picture  actor. 

His  next  word  was  no  more  brilliant.  He  touched  his 
hat  and  said : 

"Well!" 

Mem  had  not  yet  even  found  that  much  to  say.  And  he 
went  on  garrulously  to  the  extent  of: 

4 'Here  we  are,  eh?" 

There  was  no  denying  this,  and  it  was  the  first  thing  Mem's 
paralyzed  brain  could  understand,  so  she  nodded  briskly. 

Tom  Holby  laughed  at  fate  as  in  his  pictures.    He  said : 

"I've  nearly  died  of  thirst  in  the  desert  half  a  dozen  times, 
and  I've  gone  mad  twice,  but  there  was  always  a  camera  or 
two  a  few  yards  off  and  a  grub  wagon  just  outside.  And  the 
heroine  usually  came  galloping  to  the  rescue  and  picked  me 
up  in  time  for  the  final  clinch.  I  see  the  heroine,  but  the 
grub  wagon's  late." 

"Wh-what  are  we  going  to  do?" 

"Well,  I'm  not  going  to  act,  anyway,  as  long  as  there's  no 
camera  on  the  job.  Let's  sit  down  and  wait." 

"For  what?" 

"Oh,  I  guess  the  train  will  come  back,  or  another  one  will 
come  along  and  we  can  flag  it  in  plenty  of  time.  Sit  down, 
won't  you?" 

Mem  was  almost  disappointed  at  having  her  epic  turned 
into  a  commonplace.  She  resented  the  denial  of  a  noble 
experience,  now  that  his  coolness  reassured  her. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  81 

She  hated  him  a  little  more  than  ever. 

He  brushed  off  a  ledge  of  rock  with  his  hat  in  movie 
fashion  and  said: 

"Sit  dovrn  on  this  handsome  red  divan,  won't  you?  I'm 
Mr.  Holby,  by  the  way." 

"Yes,  I  know,"  she  said,  and,  feeling  that  she  ought  to 
announce  herself,  she  stammered,  "My  name  is  Steddon, 
Remember  Steddon." 

"I  always  will,"  he  said. 

"Oh,  that's  my  first  name!    Remember  is  my  first  name." 

"Oh!  What  a  beautiful  name!  Especially  for  such  a — 
such  a —  Mmm,  yes." 

He  caught  from  her  eyes  that  where  she  came  from  a  com 
pliment  from  a  stranger  was  an  insult. 

"Do  sit  down,"  he  begged,  "at  least  so  that  I  can.  I'm 
all  out  of  training  and  I'm  dog  tired." 

She  sat  down,  and  he  dropped  down  by  her.  There  was 
so  much  room  elsewhere  that  this  struck  her  as  rather  pre 
sumptuous,  but  she  could  hardly  resent  it  since  it  was  not 
her  desert. 

There  was  a  long  silence.    Then  he  mused  aloud : 

"Remember,  eh?  Great!  Robina  would  have  preferred 
that  to  the  one  she  chose.  Do  you  know  Robina?" 

"I've  seen  her." 

"Qn  the  screen?" 

"On  the  train." 

"Oh,  then  you  haven't  seen  her.  That  isn't  the  real 
Robina  that  walks  about.  That's  just  a  poor,  plain,  fright 
ened,  anxious  little  thing,  a  Cinderella  who  only  begins  to 
live  when  she  puts  on  her  glass  slippers.  She  has  to  be  so 
infernally  noble  all  day  long  that  you  can  hardly  blame  her 
for  resting  her  overworked  virtues  when  she's  off  the  lot. 
I  used  to  be  a  pretty  decent  fellow,  too,  before  I  began  to  be 
a  hero  by  trade.  But  now — gosh!  how  I  love  my  faults! 
When  there's  no  camera  on  me  I'm  a  mighty  mean  man." 

"Really!" 

"Oh,  I'm  a  fiend.  I'm  thinking  of  playing  villains  for  a 
while,  so  that  I  can  be  respectable  at  my  own  expense  out 
side  the  factory.  But  I'm  so  mussed  up  between  my  pro- 


82  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

fessional  emotions  and  my  personal  ones  that  it's  hard  to 
keep  from  acting,  on  and  off.  Now  look  at  this  situation. 
If  the  camera  gang  were  here  I'd  know  just  whac  to  do. 
I'd  be  Sir  Walter  Raleigh  in  a  Stetson  and  chaps.  But  since 
there's  just  us  two  here  and  I  have  you  in  my  power — or  you 
have  me  in  your  power — I  don't  know  just  how  to  act.  It 
depends  on  you.  Are  you  a  heroine  or  an  adventuress?" 

"I  don't  understand  you." 

"Are  you  an  onjanoo  or  a  vamp?" 

"I  don't  speak  French." 

"Then  you  must  be  an  onjanoo,"  he  said.  "In  that  case 
I  suppose  I  really  ought  to  play  the  villain  and —  But  here 
comes  the  train.  Dog-on  it!  just  as  we  were  working  up  a 
real  little  plot.  I  hope  I  haven't  compromised  you.  If 
you're  afraid  I  have,  I'll  have  to  go  back  and  hide  till  the 
next  train  comes  along.  Or  you  can,  for  I  imagine  it's 
Robina  that  reversed  the  engine.  She  probably  missed  me 
and  suspected  that  I  was  out  here  with  a  prettier  girl  than 
she  is — pardon  me !  Shall  I  go  hide  ? " 

"Oh  no!  no!  I  couldn't  think  of  it.  Noboby  knows  me. 
It  can't  make  any  difference  what  they  say  about  me." 

"Gosh!  what  an  enviable  position.  Stick  to  your  luck, 
Miss  Steddon.  May  I  help  you  down?" 


CHAPTER  XIII 

r"pHAT  was  a  chapter  in  Mem's  life. 

1  Holby  had  guessed  right.  Robina  had  looked  for 
him,  not  found  him,  and  had  set  the  whole  train  in  an 
uproar.  She  bore  down  on  the  helpless  conductor,  and 
while  he  protested  against  the  sacrilege  of  stopping  and 
reversing  the  Limited  when  it  was  already  late,  she  pulled 
the  rope  herself. 

She  knew  the  signals,  having  played  in  a  railroad  serial, 
and  she  soon  had  the  train  backing  at  full  speed. 

She  had  half  suspected  that  Tom  Holby  had  a  companion 
in  the  desert,  and  when  she  looked  out  and  saw  him  with  the 
pretty  chit  whose  magazine  he  had  picked  up,  she  was 
tempted  to  give  the  signal  to  go  ahead  again. 

She  preferred  to  give  poor  Holby  her  opinion  of  him. 
Mem  crept  back  to  her  place,  shivering  with  her  first  experi 
ence  of  stardom  and  its  conspicuousness. 

Viva  made  a  great  ado  over  her  and  had  to  hear  all  about 
it.  She  sighed  over  the  tameness  of  the  incident  as  Mem 
described  it. 

"But  then  that  was  what  was  to  be  expected,  dear-ree. 
Us  movie  people  gets  so  much  excitement  on  the  scene  that 
we're  all  wore  out  when  anything  happens  with  no  director 
around  to  tell  us  what  to  do." 

Mem  escaped  and  took  up  in  haste  her  daily  bulletin  for 
home  consumption.  Mr.  Woodville  grew  more  vivid  in  her 
letter  and  his  resemblance  to  Tom  Holby  was  amazing.  She 
even  put  in  a  little  bit  of  her  adventure  and  told  how  Mr. 
Woodville  with  marvelous  heroism  saved  her  from  a  rattle 
snake  that  charged  at  her  with  fangs  bristling  and  rattles 
in  full  play.  She  confessed  that  she  had  never  met  such  a 
man  and  that  she  really  owed  her  life  to  him. 

She  thought  this  would  lead  up  excellently  to  the  proposal 


84  SCULS    FOR    SALE 

he  was  to  make  in  the  next  day  or  two.  She  gave  this  letter 
to  the  porter,  who  dropped  it  off  at  the  next  stop. 

The  train  made  up  so  much  of  its  lost  time  that  it  was 
only  two  hours  late  when  it  drew  into  Tucson. 

Mem  was  bewildered  when  she  found  that  Tom  Holby 
was  getting  off  there,  too.  And  so  was  Robina.  But  they 
were  only  stretching  their  legs.  Holby  paused  to  say  good- 
by  to  Mem  just  as  she  was  tipping  her  porter  a  quarter  for 
two  days'  inattention. 

She  did  not  see  the  porter's  face.  It  was  hardly  as  black 
as  Robina 's  when  she  was  compelled  to  wait  while  Tom  made 
his  adieux. 

He  left  Mem  in  a  whirl.  But  her  faculties  went  round  in 
the  mad  panic  of  a  pinwheel  when  a  strange,  somber  person 
spoke  to  her  in  a  parsony  voice: 

"MissSteddon?" 

"Yes." 

"  I  am  Doctor  Galbraith,  pastor  of  the  First  Church,  here. 
Your  father  telegraphed  me  to  meet  you  at  the  train  and 
look  after  you." 

"Do  you  know  papa?" 

"No,  but  he  found  my  name  in  the  Yearbook,  and  I  shall 
be  only  too  glad  to  serve  a  brother  in  the  Lord.  I  have  found 
a  nice  boarding  house  for  you,  and  my  wife  and  I  will  look 
after  you  as  best  we  can." 

Mem  was  struck  violently  with  the  thought,  "But  what 
becomes  of  Mr.  Woodville  now?" 

She  followed  Doctor  Galbraith  as  if  she  were  the  prisoner 
of  his  untimely  kindliness,  as  indeed  she  was. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

A  DISASTROUS,  perhaps  a  ruinous,  blow  had  been  dealt 
the  girl.  And  by  the  last  hand  she  could  have  foreseen 
it  from.  And  with  the  kindliest  motive. 

It  was  all  Ben  Franklin's  fault.  The  French  praised  him 
because  "he  ripped  the  lightning  from  the  sky  and  the  scepter 
from  the  tyrant."  But  he  placed  the  lightning  as  a  scepter 
in  the  hand  of  everybody  and  made  everybody  the  tyrant. 

And  now  no  one  can  travel  so  fast  that  he  cannot  be  over 
taken  and  prevented  by  a  telegraphic  or  telephonic  message. 
The  swiftest  airship  is  a  snail. 

Mem  had  flown  by  express  for  two  days  and  two  nights 
and  left  her  father  at  home,  yet  here  he  was  in  the  proxy  of 
a  telegram,  waiting  for  her  at  the  station,  smiling  benignly 
and  throwing  the  complex  machinery  of  her  plan  into  com 
plete  disorder. 

Doctor  Steddon  had  never  for  a  moment  suspected  that 
his  daughter  was  fleeing  to  the  West  to  keep  from  breaking 
his  heart.  The  dear  old  soul  fretted  over  the  loneliness  she 
must  face  and  the  dangers  of  inexperience. 

She  had  hardly  vanished  in  her  train  when  he  had  a  sudden 
inspiration.  He  did  not  know  a  soul  in  Tucson,  but  there 
must  be  a  church  of  his  denomination  there,  and  a  pastor  to 
that  church.  The  Yearbook  contained  a  list  of  all  the 
clergymen,  and  it  was  easy  to  find  the  name  of  the  incumbent 
of  the  Tucson  pulpit.  So  he  shot  off  a  long  telegram  describ 
ing  his  daughter  and  pleading  that  she  be  met. 

He  chuckled  over  his  foresight  and  called  himself  a  stupid 
old  dolt  for  not  thinking  of  it  before.  And  his  wife  praised 
him  and  slept  easier.  She  knew  Mem's  plan  to  become 
"Mrs.  Woodville,"  but  she  had  not  imagination  enough  to 
foresee  the  effect  of  this  new  embarrassment. 

Mem  had  anticipated  almost  every  other  surprise  but  this. 


86  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

The  main  charm  of  Tucson  was  to  be  her  anonymity  there. 
When  she  heard  her  name  called,  and  by  a  clergyman,  of  all 
people,  the  gentle  providence  of  her  father  landed  like  a 
bombshell.  Tucson  rocked  under  her  feet  and  her  plot  fell 
to  pieces  in  her  hand. 

She  would  have  to  be  under  the  eye  of  Doctor  Galbraith, 
who  was  already  promising  not  to  let  her  out  of  his  pastoral 
care,  and  warning  her  that  his  wife  was  waiting  inside  the 
station. 

In  her  desperation  she  caught  sight  of  Tom  Holby,  who 
had  walked  briskly  to  the  head  of  the  train  and  was  striding 
back  to  his  car.  A  frantic  whim  led  Mem  to  say,  very  dis 
tinctly,  as  she  passed  him : 

"Good  night,  Mr.  Woodville." 

Holby  had  already  lifted  his  hat  and  made  her  a  gift  of 
one  of  his  high-priced  smiles  before  he  heard  what  she  called 
him.  He  stopped  short  with  his  hat  aloft  as  if  in  a  still  pic 
ture.  He  could  hardly  believe  his  ears.  He  was  so  used  to 
being  recognized  by  total  strangers  that  it  stunned  him  to 
be  called  out  of  his  name  by  this  girl  with  whom  he  had  been 
briefly  cast  away  in  the  desert. 

But  he  recovered  his  native  modesty,  laughed  to  himself, 
"This  is  fame!"  and  went  on. 

The  Reverend  Doctor  Galbraith  had  paused  for  a  back 
ward  glance,  but  Mem  urged  him  along,  saying,  "That's  an 
old  friend  I  met  on  the  train."  And  now  she  felt  that  she 
had  established  the  existence  of  her  Mr.  Woodville.  She 
was  already  unconsciously  "planting"  characters. 

" Oh ! "  said  Doctor  Galbraith.  "His  face  looked  familiar; 
but  I  guess  it  wasn't." 

The  reason  it  looked  familiar  was  that  lithographs  of  it 
were  pasted  up  all  over  Tucson.  Holby  was  to  appear  there 
in  a  picture.  If  Doctor  Galbraith  had  been  more  acutely 
observant,  or  had  had  a  keener  memory  for  faces,  he  would 
have  caught  Mem  in  a  tangle  of  lies.  But  he  was  thinking  of 
other  things. 

Mem  hated  Mrs.  Galbraith  with  enthusiasm  until  she 
met  her,  and  then  she  turned  out  to  be  not  at  all  the  preach 
er's  wife  as  Mem  understood  the  species,  but  a  joyous 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  87 

Western  woman  raised  on  a  ranch  and  of  a  loud  and  hilarious 
cordiality. 

Still,  Western  hospitality  is  the  most  despotic  in  the 
world,  and  sometimes  takes  the  form  of  lassoing  and  hog- 
tying  its  victim. 

Mrs.  Galbraith  embraced  Mem  and  cried,  "Isn't  she 
pretty?"  She  was  distressed  and  ashamed  because  she 
could  not  take  Mem  into  her  own  little  home,  which  was 
spilling  over  with  children.  Mem  blanched  to  think  what 
would  have  happened  to  her  plan  if  she  had  been  incar 
cerated  in  a  parson's  household.  The  boarding  house  the 
Galbraiths  had  selected  for  her  was  all  too  near  them,  as  it 
was.  They  commended  her  to  the  care  of  the  landlady  and 
left  her.  And  the  landlady  drove  Mem  almost  to  insult  by 
trying  to  mother  the  poor,  lonely  thing. 

Mem  was  so  beset  by  human  kindness  that  she  was  about 
ready  to  murder  her  next  benefactor.  She  longed  for  a  bit 
of  refreshing  selfishness  and  indifference. 

Her  room  had  been  occupied  by  various  predecessors  who 
left  various  traces  of  themselves ;  one  left  cigarette  burns  on 
the  edges  of  all  the  tables  and  the  mantel.  But  somebody 
had  left  a  few  novels.  They  were  frightfully  tempting. 

There  was  an  electric  light  over  the  head  of  the  bed — a 
very  marvelous  affair.  A  twist  of  the  key  turned  it  on,  and 
one  could  lie  and  read  till  sleep  drew  near,  then  merely  reach 
up  and  switch  on  the  blessed  dark  with  a  snap  of  the  key. 

After  a  hot  bath  and  a  vigorous  scrubbing  of  her  hair  Mem 
yielded  to  temptation  and  enjoyed  all  the  pleasant  anguish 
of  a  major  sin  when  she  lay  outstretched  in  her  nightgown, 
with  her  hair  spread  out  on  her  upright  pillow  and  a  romance 
on  the  desk  of  her  knees. 

Cleopatra  could  hardly  have  felt  so  luxurious  on  a  golden 
divan  covered  with  silk  and  fanned  by  slaves  as  Mem  felt 
in  that  boarding-house  bed.  Cleopatra  had  perhaps  novels 
enough  to  read,  since  the  Egyptians  were  ardent  story 
tellers,  but  she  could  not  have  tasted  the  sweets  of  stolen 
fruit  or  had  her  delight  heightened  by  a  struggle  with  an 
overtrained  conscience. 

The  novel  that  held  Mem  spellbound  was  Thomas  Hardy's 


88  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

Two  on  a  Tower,  that  epic  of  two  souls  against  a  background 
of  stars — against  that  starless  "hole  in  the  sky"  which 
astronomers  believed  in  when  Hardy  wrote  the  book. 

This  parson's  daughter  began  her  fictional  education  at 
the  top.  She  lost  many  of  the  signals  by  which  discreet 
authors  indicate  to  sophisticated  readers  that  things  not  to 
be  mentioned  are  going  on.  But  as  she  read  and  read, 
growing  wider  and  wider  awake  and  panting  as  if  her  body 
were  running  as  swiftly  as  her  mind,  it  gradually  dawned  on 
her  what  had  happened  to  the  heroine  of  the  story,  the 
haughty  lady  who  lingered  too  long  on  the  lonely  tower 
with  the  young  astronomer  for  companion  and  only  the 
stars  for  duennas  at  a  most  unrespectable  distance.  When 
the  astronomer  sailed  for  Australia  in  ignorance  of  the  plight 
of  the  lady,  Mem's  heart  jumped  almost  out  of  her  mouth, 
for  she  realized  the  similarity  of  her  problem  to  that  of  the 
heroine.  Her  own  lover  had  sailed  away  to  a  farther  port 
than  the  Antipodes,  and  even  more  irrevocably. 

She  raced  through  the  succeeding  pages  to  see  how  the 
heroine  would  solve  her  doubly  harrowing  riddle  of 
having  yielded  to  a  plebeian  and  of  paying  the  most  plebeian 
penalty.  When  she  found  that  Mr.  Hardy's  heroine,  who 
had  been  vainly  besought  in  love  by  an  old  bishop,  simply 
wheedled  him  into  a  renewal  of  his  proposal  and  married 
him  in  haste,  Mem  gave  up.  She  could  get  no  help  from  the 
book.  No  bishop  was  courting  her.  Even  if  she  had  been 
willing  to  dupe  a  trusting  lover,  she  had  none  to  dupe. 

The  next  morning,  when  Mrs.  Galbraith  called  to  take  her 
for  a  ride,  Mem  was  looking  more  jaded  than  the  evening 
before.  The  parson's  wife  advised  her  to  get  out  into  the 
desert  as  soon  as  possible,  and  told  her,  for  her  encourage 
ment,  how  her  own  husband  had  hardly  lived  through  the 
long  journey  West  and  had  been  laid  down  like  a  sack  of 
bones  on  the  sands.  Then  the  desert  magic  had  begun,  and 
now  he  was  hale  and  vociferous  "and  his  doctors  all  dead." 
So  strange  a  thing  is  water:  a  little  too  little  and  the  body 
shrivels  away  from  the  soul,  a  little  too  much  and  the  body 
coughs  the  soul  away. 

But  Mem  was  not  cheered  with  promises  of  life.     There 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  89 

was  too  much  life  in  her  and  she  could  not  manage  her 
future.  She  could  not  dream  of  the  sacrilege  of  suicide,  but 
she  would  have  been  glad  to  be  told  that  she  would  pine 
away  swiftly  and  beautifully. 

Mrs.  Galbraith,  chattering  incessantly  and  as  braggart 
as  a  guide,  drove  about  the  city  spread  level  in  a  circus  ring 
of  gray  granite  mountains.  Everything  far-Western  was 
picturesque  to  the  mid-Western  girl ;  the  sorriest  and  tamest 
Mexicans  were  swart  bandits  of  dark  capabilities;  the 
Santa  Rita  Hotel  in  its  Spanish  architecture  was  something 
out  of  the  Alhambra.  The  old  mission  dating  back  to  1687 
was  an  astonishment  to  her.  (The  oldest  building  at  home 
in  Calverly  was  proud  of  its  1887.)  The  mountain  devoted 
to  the  Botanical  Laboratory  was  a  cubist  landscape,  a 
vegetable  zoo.  She  could  not  understand  the  science  that 
was  taking  lessons  humbly  from  the  cactus,  learning  how  to 
live  on  next  to  nothing  a  year,  and  teaching  mankind  how 
to  turn  the  bleakest  desert  into  a  paradise.  That  was  just 
what  she  might  do  with  her  own  life;  but  she  had  no  heart 
for  it  and  she  did  not  want  to  look  like  a  cactus. 

On  the  way  back  to  her  boarding  house  she  noted  many 
of  Tom  Holby's  portraits  on  the  billboards.  He  was  not 
the  star  of  the  picture.  Robina  Teele  was  the  star.  Yet  in 
one  gaudy  poster  she  cowered  helpless  and  wide-eyed  while 
Holby  was  shown  fighting  with  a  human  gorilla.  She  was 
a  dance-hall  girl  in  the  Yukon,  it  seemed,  kept  miraculously 
pure,  like  a  mediaeval  saint  amid  temptations  and  devils. 
And  Holby  was  an  Argonaut  who  believed  her  innocent 
because  he  was  himself  innocent. 

Mem  felt  a  longing  to  see  this  heroic  picture.  But  Mrs. 
Galbraith  would  not  leave  her  for  a  moment,  and  the  night 
was  prayer-meeting  night. 

Mem  attended  the  evening  devotions.  There  was  nothing 
strange  to  her  in  the  drowsy,  cozy  atmosphere,  the  sparse 
company  singing  hymns  and  bowing  in  prayer  and  finding 
a  mystical  comfort  in  the  thought  of  sins  forgiven  and  an 
eternal  home  beyond  the  grave. 

Doctor  and  Mrs.  Galbraith  took  her  back  to  her  lodgings 
and  left  her.  They  had  no  objection  to  moving  pictures  and 


9o  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

attended  them  often,  but  Mem  did  not  know  this,  and  she 
felt  like  a  thief  when  her  worser  self  compelled  her  better 
self  to  a  dark  dishonesty.  Both  selves  went  to  the  movies! 

If  the  cinema  store  had  been  an  opium  den  Mem  could 
not  have  sneaked  more  guiltily  into  it. 

She  was  so  ignorant  of  the  conventions  that  when  she 
put  down  her  money  and  a  ticket  sprang  up  at  her  out  of 
a  slot,  and  her  change  came  tobogganing  down  a  little  chute, 
she  jumped  and  had  to  be  told  what  to  do. 

When  she  had  found  a  seat  in  the  dark  hall  she  was  so 
illiterate  in  the  staples  of  fiction  that  she  tingled  with  excite 
ment  over  hackneyed  situations  that  left  many  a  sophisti 
cated  child  yawning  and  gave  never  a  pause  to  the  swaying 
jaws  of  the  gum-grinding  crowd. 

There  were  both  novelty  and  conviction  for  her  in  the 
pseudo- Alaskan  snow  scenes,  the  bloodcurdling  escapes 
from  death  at  the  hands  of  desperadoes  or  the  fangs  of 
wolves,  the  blizzards  that  snarled  the  sledge  dogs  into  tangles 
of  hopeless  misery  and  confronted  the  wayfarers  with 
hideous  death. 

Most  of  the  audience  knew  the  actors  and  actresses  in  the 
picture  by  reputation,  had  seen  them  in  other  pictures,  and 
read  more  or  less  fabulous  stories  of  their  personal  lives. 

The  familiar  situations  rehashed  and  warmed  over  had 
the  charm  of  old  fairy  stories  remodeled  again  and  again  by 
fatigued  parents  for  insatiable  youngsters. 

But  Mem  was  experiencing  an  agitation  such  as  she  had 
not  known  since  first  her  mother  told  her  about  Little  Red 
Riding  Hood  and  growled  like  a  wolf,  showing  long  white 
teeth. 

One  thing  impressed  Mem  amazingly.  She  had  just  seen 
a  handful  of  sleepy  people  at  the  once-a-week  prayer  meet 
ing.  Here  she  saw  a  packed  house,  the  fifth  packed  house 
that  day,  and  it  had  been  so  every  day  of  the  week. 

It  was  inherent  in  certain  natures  to  be  solemnly  con 
vinced  that  whatever  draws  crowds  should  be  stopped; 
whatever  a  great  many  people  want  to  see  or  do  must  be 
put  out  of  their  reach.  The  principle  is  simple  and  direct; 
the  public  is  a  naughty  child  that  cannot  be  trusted  a  mo- 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  91 

ment;  the  moralist  is  nurse  and  must  take  away  from  it 
everything  it  reaches  for,  and  force  it  to  take  whatever  is 
supposed  to  be  good  for  it. 

Hissing  and  reproach  are  the  portion  of  the  man  who 
resists  the  altruistic  cruelty  of  zealots  who  would  save  his 
soul  in  spite  of  him.  The  zealots  have  always  been  even 
more  cruel  than  the  despots,  for  the  czars  have  worked  only 
for  their  own  aggrandizement,  but  the  zealots  have  the 
terrible  fault  that  they  labor  meekly  for  the  glory  of  their 
God. 

The  late  war  of  the  nations  was  followed  in  America,  as 
elsewhere,  by  a  recrudescence  of  the  eternal  war  between 
enforced  morality  and  liberty.  Having  closed  the  saloons, 
the  busy  agents  of  vicarious  virtue  ran  about  closing  moving- 
picture  houses  on  Sunday,  clipping  whole  scenes  out  of 
films  and  subjecting  them  all  to  the  whimsical  approval  of 
hired  censors;  assailing  tobacco  as  a  devil's  weed  and  for 
bidding  school-teachers  to  smoke  even  in  their  own  homes. 
The  cigarette,  of  which  billions  had  been  consumed  by  the 
triumphant  soldiers,  was  actually  banned  in  many  states. 
In  Kentucky,  preachers  and  mobs  of  zealots  demanded  a 
law  2  gainst  teaching  the  infamous  doctrine  of  evolution. 
In  Illinois,  a  religious  community  forbade  the  teaching  of 
the  atheistic  idiocy  concerning  the  roundness  of  the  earth 
and  its  revolutions  about  a  distant  sun.  No  lie  was  ever 
too  ridiculous  or  unjust,  no  slander  too  vicious,  no  invasion 
of  human  rights  too  outrageous,  for  those  who  pretended 
that  they  were  saving  souls. 

And  while  the  moralists  were  denouncing  the  moving 
pictures  for  their  wickedness,  the  critics  were  despising  them 
for  their  triteness.  But  Mem  was  neither  moralist  nor 
artist ;  she  was  a  young  woman  watching  an  epic  unfolded. 

She  was  seeing  Tom  Holby  risk  life  and  limb  in  the  defense 
of  beauty.  She  was  seeing  chivalry  defying  the  cruel  North 
and  glorifying  womanhood  with  knightly  reverence  and 
service. 

There  was  something  Homeric  in  the  plot,  if  one  could 
forget  its  age.  In  Homer's  work  a  war  was  waged  for  a 
woman,  and  women  walked  through  all  the  pages — the 


92  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

ox-eyed,  the  laughter-loving  goddesses  and  their  shining 
daughters,  Helen  and  Iphigenia,  Cressida  and  Andromache, 
Nausicaa  and  Penelope. 

In  a  later  day,  Vergil  would  show  a  hero  who  ran  away 
from  a  languishing  queen,  but  Homer's  warriors  fought  for 
women.  Where  Vergil  began,  "I  sing  of  arms  and  a  man," 
Homer  cried,  "Sing,  Goddess."  The  Greek  tragedies  and 
comedies  were  about  women.  The  mediaeval  romances 
concerning  them,  the  plays  of  Shakespeare,  Racine,  Moli&re, 
and  all  the  others  devoted  themselves  to  the  woman  prob 
lem.  Even  Dante  celebrated  an  ideal  townswoman,  and 
the  most  poignant  scene  in  his  "Inferno"  was  the  coupled 
tragedy  of  Paolo  and  Francesca  da  Rimini.  Sex  had  always 
been,  as  it  must  always  be,  the  main  theme  of  nine-tenths 
of  fiction.  To  attempt  to  fetter  its  discussion  was  only  to 
emphasize  it  by  repression  and  change  the  symbols  without 
altering  the  meaning. 

Mem's  soul  was  young;  it  still  inhabited  the  golden  age 
of  epopee.  Simple,  direct  anxiety  of  sex  for  sex  was  new 
and  wonderful  to  her.  She  was  astounded  at  the  courage 
of  Tom  Holby.  It  wrung  her  heart  to  see  him  plowing 
across  white  Saharas  of  snow,  to  see  him  challenge  the 
barroom  bully  and  beat  him  down  and  stand,  torn,  bleeding, 
and  panting,  over  him.  It  melted  her  soul  to  see  his  tender 
ness  with  the  girl,  the  waif  of  fortune,  whose  indomitable 
purity  had  withstood  years  of  life  in  a  gambling  hell. 

Being  a  woman,  she  was  not  quite  convinced  of  Robina's 
supersaintly  innocences,  but  she  had  no  doubt  of  Tom 
Holby  as  Galahad.  And  when  he  begged  the  soiled  dove  of 
the  Klondike  to  honor  him  with  marriage,  Mem  wondered 
if  such  a  parfait  gentil  knight  might  not  be  waiting  somewhere 
to  rescue  her  from  ignominy  to  bliss. 

When  the  picture  was  irised  out  upon  Tom  clenching 
Robina  to  his  big  chest,  and  the  lights  went  up  in  the  theater, 
revealing  an  Arizona  audience  instead  of  an  Alaskan  soli 
tude,  she  sighed  and  rose  to  face  her  lonely  boarding  house. 


CHAPTER  XV 

AS  Mem  went  slowly  out  with  the  straggling  crowd  she 
was  overwhelmed  with  a  loneliness  for  life,  for  love, 
for  some  one  to  fight  for  her  and  uphold  her  in  the  deep 
waters;  and  then  for  a  taste  of  the  spiced  wines  of 
romance. 

She  cried  aloud  in  the  silence  of  her  room  for  Elwood 
Farnaby  to  come  back  and  help  her,  to  come  back  and  claim 
his  right  to  the  splendor  of  existence.  Grief  sprang  at  her 
like  a  puma  leaping  down  from  a  tree  and  tore  her  with 
claws  of  anguish,  set  fangs  into  her  heart  and  shook  it. 

In  her  room  as  she  took  off  her  clothes  with  listless 
hands  she  remembered  her  parents.  She  had  not  written 
to  them  for  two  days,  and  she  had  not  carried  Mr.  Woodville 
forward. 

She  sat  down  and  began  a  letter.  Everything  she  could 
think  of  to  write  involved  some  difficulty.  She  described 
her  arrival  at  Tucson,  her  surprise  at  being  met  by  Mr. 
and  Mrs.  Galbraith.  She  squandered  reckless  praise  of  her 
father  for  his  ever-watchful  protection  and  the  comfort  of 
feeling  that  he  and  his  prayers  were  always  on  guard.  She 
praised  the  Galbraiths  for  their  thoughtful  attention. 

Then  she  flung  the  pen  down  in  disgust  at  the  hypocrisy 
of  her  words  and  in  revolt  at  the  deep  damnation  of  her 
whole  plan.  But  rebel  as  she  would,  she  must  go  on.  She 
could  not  turn  back  now.  One  thing  was  certain — she 
must  free  herself  from  the  Galbraiths;  she  must  get  out  of 
Tucson.  She  must  become  Mrs.  Woodville  at  once. 

Life  would  not  wait  for  her.  She  was  like  a  serial  writer 
at  whose  shoulder  a  nagging  editor  stands  insisting.  She 
was  like  Dostoieffsky,  sick  and  confused,  but  unable  to 
escape  the  necessity  for  filling  the  pages  as  fast  as  the  ink 
could  run,  unable  to  recall  any  written  page  since  it  was 


94  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

printed  almost  before  the  next  was  written.  And  the  title 
of  her  serial  was  also  "Crime  and  Punishment."  Her 
crime  was  not  ruthless  murder,  but  reckless  creation.  She 
had  not  driven  an  old  woman  out  of  the  world,  she  was 
reluctantly  dragging  a  child  into  it,  yet  society  was  as  eager 
to  find  her  out  and  disgrace  her  as  the  slayer. 

For  a  night  and  a  day  she  paced  the  jail  of  her  room  and 
beat  her  brains  against  the  iron  bars  of  her  problem.  She 
could  not  break  through.  She  could  not  worm  her  way 
through.  She  had  no  imagination,  no  inventiveness.  She 
was  just  an  ordinary  girl  who  wanted  to  keep  from  hurt 
ing  anybody  and  was  finding  it  mighty  difficult. 

She  was  tempted  to  send  Doctor  Bretherick  a  confession 
of  failure  and  ask  him  to  revise  his  continuity,  but  she  was 
afraid  to  face  the  telegraph  office  with  such  a  message  and 
afraid  to  have  it  received  at  home.  She  dared  not  wait  a 
week  for  a  letter  to  come  and  go;  and,  besides,  her  author 
was  at  such  a  distance  that  he  could  not  understand  the 
emergency.  It  is  well  for  authors  to  keep  in  close  touch  with 
their  plays  and  pictures  in  the  making. 

She  would  probably  have  given  up  trying  if  a  bit  of  luck 
had  not  befallen  her.  It  was  her  habit  of  mind  to  credit  it 
to  a  relenting  Providence.  When  things  went  wrong  she 
blamed  herself;  when  they  took  a  turn  for  the  better  she 
blessed  Heaven.  She  saw  divine  purpose  in  the  very  bun 
gling  of  circumstance  that  kept  her  frantic  with  uncertainties. 

On  the  fourth  morning  of  her  suspense  Mrs.  Galbraith 
rode  over  in  haste  and  distress  to  explain  that  her  husband 
and  she  had  to  leave  Tucson  for  a  few  days  to  attend  his 
father's  funeral.  She  promised  to  hasten  back,  and  begged 
Mem  Steddon's  forgiveness  for  deserting  her. 

Mem  was  not  quite  sure  that  Heaven  had  slain  the  elder 
Mr.  Galbraith  just  on  purpose  to  help  her  out  of  her  diffi 
culty,  but  she  had  a  hard  time  to  keep  Mrs.  Galbraith 
from  realizing  how  glad  she  was  to  be  rid  of  her  and  her 
husband. 

And  as  soon  as  Mrs.  Galbraith  had  gone,  she  assailed  her 
problem  with  a  new  ardor.  It  was  plainly  a  time  for  quick 
and  decisive  action. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  95 

She  threw  caution  aside  and  forbore  to  regard  the  perils 
of  inconsistency.  She  wrote  her  father  and  mother  a  hasty 
letter  to  which  the  lilt  of  hope  unconsciously  contributed 
an  atmosphere  of  bridal  bliss. 

MY  DARLING  MAMMA  AND  PAPA, — Well,  you  have  lost  your 
daughter — not  by  fell  disease,  but  by  fell  in  love.  You  may  say 
it  is  good  riddance  of  bad  rubbish — but  it  hurt  me  to  lose  the 
noble  name  of  Steddon — even  for  the  beautiful  title  of  Woodville — 
for  that's  what  I've  been  and  gone  and  done — yes,  I'm  married 
now — I  meant  to  break  it  to  you  gentler  but  it  popped  out.  So 
I'll  leave  it. 

You  see,  Mr.  Woodville — John — was  so  attentive  and  kind  and 
considerate  and  respectful — almost  reverent,  you  might  say — and 
he's  so  big  and  handsome  and  fine  and  noble,  and  I  was  so  small 
and  lonely  and  so  far  away  for  so  long  that — oh,  I  just  couldent 
resist. 

He  stayed  in  Tucson  (by  the  way,  it  is  pronounced  tooson,  not 
tuckson)  for  several  days  longer  than  he  planned  because  he  said 
he  couldent  tear  himself  away  from  me — but  finally  he  had  to  leave 
for  Yuma  and  he  said  he  couldent  live  without  poor  little  me.  I 
felt  I  couldent  live  without  him.  And  why  should  I  deny  myself  a 
protector  and  the  highest  glory  of  womanhood? 

So  he  begged  me  to  marry  him  and  go  to  Yuma — I  had  about 
decided  that  Tucson  was  not  the  right  place  for  me,  anyway.  My 
cough  is  much  better  but  not  enough  better  to  quite  suit,  so  I  con 
sented  to  marry  John.  Dr.  Galbraith  was  awfully  nice  to  me  but 
he  was  called  away  by  the  unfortunate  death  of  his  father  so  he 
couldent  marry  us  so  we  were  married  by  Rev.  Mr.  Smjxns  [here 
she  wrote  a  name  illegibly]. 

I  havent  time  to  write  you  more,  for  John  is  waiting  and  our 
train  wont.  I'll  write  a  longer  letter  when  I  have  the  liesure. 

I  do  hope  you  will  be  happy  as  I  am  about  it.  You  havent  lost 
a  daughter  but  gained  a  son.  We  leave  at  once  for  Yuma,  so  address 
all  your  letters  to  me  as  Mrs.  John  Woodville,  General  Delivery, 
Yuma.  Doesnt  it  sound  grand,  though? 

I  dont  know  how  long  we  shall  be  there  as  John  is  looking  over 
some  properties  and  doesnt  know  just  where  to  settle  yet. 

I  wish  I  could  write  you  that  he  is  terribly  rich,  but  while  he 
hopes  to  be  some  day,  he  is  very  poor  just  now.  But  he  is  such  a 
noble  man  and  noble  hearts  are  better  than  cornets  as  the  poet 
saith,  and  I  shall  try  to  be  a  help  to  him  and  some  day  we  will  pay 
back  the  money  I  have  taken  away  from  you  poor  darlings. 


96  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

Well  I  must  close  for  the  present.  Dont  stop  loveing  me  just 
because  I  have  a  husband.  But  send  us  your  blessings. 

Your  loveing,  loveing  daughter 

MEM. 

She  was  exhausted  by  the  soul  strain  and  she  had  to  rest 
mind  and  body  before  she  could  undertake  the  task  of 
writing  the  Galbraiths  a  similar  letter  with  the  necessary 
changes.  It  was  only  herself  that  she  had  to  conquer,  since 
she  did  not  have  to  look  the  recipients  in  the  eye. 

There  was  a  kind  of  mischievous  hilarity  in  the  tone  of 
her  letter  to  the  too-kind  clergyman  and  his  oversolicitous 
wife: 

DEAR  DR.  AND  MRS.  GALBRAITH, — What  you  will  think  of  me 
I  can  well  imagine.  Ingrattitude  is  the  least  thing  you  will  think  of. 
But  I  dont  mean  to  be  ungrateful. 

You  see  it  is  this  way — on  the  train — as  I  wrote  Mamma  and 
Papa — I  met  an  old  friend — he  was  terribly  nice  to  me  and — I  cant 
understand  why — but  he  fell  in  love  with  me.  I  can  tell  why  I 
should  fall  in  love  with  him,  though.  Anyway  we  did  so — we 
expected  to  get  married  some  day — I  wanted  you  to  meet  him  but 
he  was  awfully  busy  and  then  you  had  to  leave — and  then  John 
had  to  go  away  and  he  said  he  couldent  live  without  me  and  I 
dident  want  him  to  die — so — as  he  had  to  leave  at  once  and  he 
asked  me  to  marry  him  right  away — I  did  so — and  now  I  am  Mrs. 
John  Woodville,  if  you  please. 

John  has  some  properties  to  look  over  so  we  dont  know  just  yet 
just  where  we  will  settle  down  so  you  will  have  to  address  me  at 
General  Delivery,  Yuma,  Mrs.  John  Woodville. 

I  can  never  never  thank  you  enough — John  says  to  thank  you 
for  him — and  hopeing  to  see  you  soon  again. 
Yours  most  gratefully 

REMEMBER  STEDDON  WOODVILLE. 

Mem  laughed  as  she  wrote  and  sealed  this  letter,  and  was 
most  grateful  to  the  Galbraiths  for  their  absence. 

But  her  landlady  had  to  be  dealt  with  face  to  face  or 
she  could  not  get  her  trunk  away.  The  landlady  had  expected 
to  keep  her  guest  for  a  long  while,  and  as  usual  worked  both 
ends  of  the  game.  When  she  had  rented  the  room  to  Mem 
she  had  explained  that  her  prices  were  high  because  of  the 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  97 

heavy  demand;  when  Mem  wanted  to  unrent  the  room, 
the  landlady  complained  that  she  would  lose  the  use  of  it, 
as  the  demand  had  died. 

MI  m  had  to  pay  for  the  balance  of  the  month  and  this 
took  important  dollars  from  her  scant  funds;  but  it  gave 
her  the  strength  to  be  curt  when  the  landlady  gasped  at 
her  instructions  that  any  letters  coming  to  Miss  Remember 
Steddon  should  be  readdressed  to  "Mrs.  John  Woodville, 
General  Delivery,  Yuma,  Arizona." 

The  landlady's  natural  cackling  over  the  unearthing  of 
a  romance  was  rigidly  suppressed  by  Mem  with  as  much 
calm  as  if  she  had  been  getting  married  every  few  days. 

She  was  not  so  stolid  when  she  set  out  upon  her  next 
errand.  She  had  to  buy  her  wardrobe  for  the  third  act,  her 
widow's  weeds.  She  was  going  to  save  a  lot  of  money  by 
purchasing  no  bridal  gear  at  all,  no  veil,  no  orange  blos 
soms,  no  trousseau,  for  her  honeymoon  was  to  be  as  imag 
inary  as  her  wedding.  But  her  mourning  must  be  visible. 

As  she  moved  slowly  down  the  Tucson  street  to  a  dry- 
goods  store  to  buy  a  crape  dress  and  hat  and  veil,  she  was 
dogged  by  a  feeling  of  dreadful  foreboding.  To  pretend  to 
get  married  was  a  pleasant  little  comedy,  but  to  put  on  false 
mourning  was  to  carry  the  lie  into  the  realm  of  grisly  crime. 
A  superstitious  dread  assailed  her  that  if  she  put  on  the 
inky  suit  of  woe  she  would  soon  have  a  real  reason  for  it. 
Some  one  dear  to  her  would  die,  and  she  would  somehow 
be  to  blame  for  it. 

She  glanced  over  her  shoulder  timorously  and  felt  a  some 
thing  at  heel.  She  felt  as  one  might  who,  lost  in  the  wilder 
ness  and  struggling  with  weakening  steps  to  reach  safety, 
sees  a  famished  wolf  following  at  a  little  distance,  sees  over 
head  an  impatient  buzzard  making  slow  circles  across  his 
path. 

But  she  must  go  on  and  cheat  the  wolf  and  the  buzzard 
if  she  could.  She  had  such  distaste  for  the  business  that  she 
was  not  quite  ready  for  the  natural  questions  of  the  sales 
woman  who  met  her  demand  for  a  mourning  costume.  Was 
it  first  or  second  mourning,  half  mourning?  Did  she  wish 
very  deep  mourning,  and  what  size?  Was  it  for  herself  or 


98  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

a  relative?  For  herself?  Oh,  that  was  too  bad!  And  was 
it  a  father  she  had  lost?  Not  a  husband?  Oh,  how  sad! 
Was  it  very  sudden?  An  accident  or  an  illness?  Mem  had 
not  yet  decided  which  it  was  to  be,  and  her  guilty  confusion 
might  well  have  been  taken  for  a  confession  of  murder. 
That  was  what  she  felt  it  must  be. 

The  saleswoman's  curiosity  was  quickened  to  torment 
by  the  evasiveness  of  Mem's  mumbled  answers,  and  when 
Mem  declined  to  have  the  things  sent  to  her  address,  and 
asked  to  have  them  put  in  a  box  for  her  to  carry,  the  sales 
woman  could  not  conceal  her  agitation.  Mem  caught  her 
glance  as  she  looked  for  a  wedding  ring  on  Mem's  bare  hand. 

This  frightened  Mem  and  increased  her  despair  of  success, 
but  she  had  to  hold  herself  in  control  long  enough  to  march 
out  as  a  dazed  relict  of  blighted  hope.  It  was  hard  to  man 
age  this  and  carry  a  large  bundle,  too;  but  she  reached  the 
sidewalk  somehow. 

The  saleswoman's  suspicions  had  given  her  a  hint.  She 
stopped  at  a  jewelry  store  and  bought  herself  a  plain  gold 
band.  She  wore  it  out  of  the  store,  explaining  that  she 
had  lost  her  first  ring. 

When  she  returned  to  her  boarding  house  the  landlady, 
whose  inquisitiveness  was  still  simmering  to  a  boil,  let  her 
in.  As  Mem  locked  glances  with  her  defiantly  she  saw  the 
landlady's  eyes  go  to  her  hand  and  widen  with  recognition 
of  the  wedding  ring. 

Mem  let  the  box  of  mourning  fall  to  the  floor.  If  it  had 
broken  open — !  The  landlady  gasped: 

"You  ain't  married  a'ready?" 

"Yes." 

"Lord  o'  mercy!  that's  the  quickest  work  I  ever  did  see! 
Where's  your  husband?" 

"Minding  his  business — his  own  business!" 

She  regretted  the  unwarranted  insolence  instantly,  but 
it  served  to  put  the  landlady  on  the  defensive  and  taught 
Mem  the  value  of  bluff,  and  the  military  rule:  when  your 
position  is  weak,  leave  it — and  attack. 

The  landlady  fried  in  her  own  fat  trying  to  figure  out 
what  sort  of  creature  Mem  was,  but  the  next  morning  she 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  99 

was  gone.  A  few  days  later  a  letter  came  for  "Miss  Sted- 
don."  Before  readdressing  it,  the  landlady  could  not  resist 
steaming  it  open.  It  proved  to  be  a  message  of  love  from 
the  girl's  father.  Among  many  expressions  of  uneasiness 
for  the  poor  child  was  a  pleasant  word  for  Mr.  Woodville; 
also  a  pious  hope  that  the  splendid  gentleman  would  be  a 
real  protection  and  comfort  to  the  little  wanderer. 

Thus  one  dupe  dupes  another  and  the  fooled  father  fooled 
the  landlady  by  confirming  the  lie  Mem  had  told  her.  With 
all  doubts  as  to  the  girl's  honesty  allayed,  the  mistress  of 
the  boarding  house  crossed  out  "Miss  Steddon,"  wrote, 
"Mrs.  John  Woodville,  General  Delivery,  Yuma,"  and 
glued  the  flap  down  again. 


CHAPTER  XVI 

THE  early-morning  train  from  Tucson  would  deposit 
Mem  at  Yuma  in  the  midafternoon.  The  railroad  was 
never  far  from  the  Mexican  border  and  the  desert  was 
stinging  hot. 

Yet  Mem  suffered  an  inner  chill  and  her  flesh  crept  clam 
mily  at  what  she  had  to  do;  for  on  that  journey  she  was  to 
get  rid  of  her  husband. 

He  had  been  vague  before,  but  as  she  made  ready  to 
slaughter  him  he  became  fearsomely  real.  She  went  through 
the  experience  of  a  bravo  who  had  lightly  accepted  a  com 
mission  to  assassinate  a  stranger,  but,  on  meeting  him  and 
coming  to  know  him,  found  him  likable,  lovable,  and  his 
destruction  abominable. 

The  scenes  the  train  swept  her  through  were  as  damned 
as  her  deed — a  famine-land  of  stunted  growth  or  none. 

John  W oodville  sat  beside  her  in  the  train.  He  vanished  as 
soon  as  she  turned  to  look  his  way,  but  when  she  gazed  with 
unfocused  lenses  through  the  window  at  the  blurred  sand 
and  sage  his  presence  was  almost  palpable. 

When  she  closed  her  scorched  eyes  she  could  almost  feel 
him  leaning  against  her  shoulder,  his  breath  stirring  the 
little  curls  at  the  nape  of  her  neck.  He  took  in  warm,  strong 
ringers  her  cold  hand  lying  idle  at  her  side.  In  the  dark  of 
her  shut  eyes  he  put  his  arm  about  her  shoulder  and  drew 
her  to  him  and  kissed  her  cheek,  whispering,  "My  wife!" 
He  turned  her  head  and  pressed  on  her  pale  mouth  so  master 
ful  a  kiss  that  her  lips  reddened  and  quivered. 

She  tried  to  summon  her  dead  lover  to  the  defense  of  his 
rights  in  her  possession,  but  Elwood  was  more  unreal  now, 
more  remote,  than  the  mirage  of  this  conqueror. 

She  tried  to  fling  him  off  by  opening  her  eyes  and  re-estab 
lishing  the  other  passengers  in  the  crowded  car,  but  the 


SOULS    FOR   SAL'S 

somnolence  of  the  burning  morning  dragged  her  back  to 
the  weird  world  of  sleep. 

As  her  eyes  closed  she  caught  sight  of  a  cowboy  racing 
the  train  on  a  plunging  broncho,  and  when  she  fell  asleep 
she  fell  into  the  saddle  of  a  pinto  alongside  John  Woodville's 
mustang.  And  she  rode  with  him  across  the  sage-spotted 
sands,  toward  the  brown  mountains,  and  found  there  a 
cabin  in  a  dark  grove.  And  it  was  their  new  home.  She 
was  the  mistress  of  it,  but  he  was  the  master  of  her,  a  ruth 
less,  laughing  husband,  who  would  not  be  denied,  but  mocked 
her  fears  and  made  her  his  wife,  broke  her  to  his  will  as  he 
broke  the  wildly  resisting  broncho. 

She  ran,  pursued  but  overtaken,  and  woke  with  a  start, 
spent  and  panting,  and  stared  at  the  drowsy  passengers. 

She  was  astounded  and  a  little  disappointed  to  find  her 
self  still  on  the  same  car.  His  hot  cheek  against  hers  was 
only  the  sun-baked  windowpane  tinkling  with  the  rain  of 
the  blown  sand. 

She  fought  off  the  swooning  drowsiness  that  dragged  her 
back  to  a  siesta  of  fancy,  and  devoted  herself  to  the  stern 
task  of  arranging  a  plausible  death  for  her  shore-lived 
bridegroom. 

Fear  of  discovery  was  as  acute  in  Mem's  heart  as  if  she 
were  planning  genuine  homicide.  Some  authors  have  wept 
over  the  slaughter  of  their  creatures;  some  have  rejoiced  in 
their  murder  as  a  fine  art.  But  Mem  was  a  beginner,  a 
bungler.  She  was  bound  to  make  a  bad  job  of  it,  and  she 
could  not  trust  her  imagination. 

After  an  hour  or  two  of  deep  study  that  only  increased 
her  sense  of  hopeless  floundering,  she  went  to  her  luncheon 
in  the  dining  car.  It  was  hard  to  play  executioner  on  an 
empty  stomach.  On  her  way  back  to  her  place  she  saw  on 
an  empty  seat  a  newspaper.  The  owner  had  plainly  finished 
with  it  and  tossed  it  aside.  He  was  not  visible  and  she 
resolved  that  theft  was  a  proper  prelude  to  a  greater  atrocity. 

So  she  snatched  up  the  paper  and  carried  it  back  to  her 
place.  It  was  the  Los  Angeles  Times,  an  enormous  budget 
filled  with  the  proud  expression  of  the  fastest-growing  city 
in  the  world,  a  city  tumultuous  with  prosperity  at  a  time 


io2  SOULS    FOR   SALE 

when  nearly  every  other  city  and  town  was  cowering  under 
the  aftermath  of  the  World  War. 

Mem  found  (as  is  to  be  expected  in  any  newspapers  but 
those  curious  documents  built  to  suit  the  ostriches  who 
believe  in  concealing  reference  to  crime  and  other  departures 
from  monotony)  many  accounts  of  murders,  robberies,  acci 
dents,  and  other  manifestations  of  human  fallibility. 

Magnificent  burglaries  were  properly  chronicled.  Nearly 
every  day  somebody  seemed  to  loot  a  mail  train  or  a  bank 
messenger  of  the  ransom  of  a  dozen  dukes.  Highway  rob 
bery  was  bringing  back  the  glorious  days  of  Dick  Turpin, 
Jonathan  Wild,  and  Claude  Duval.  Those  who  stood  quietly 
behind  their  counters  had  drama  brought  to  them  on  the 
tip  of  a  pistol;  those  who  motored  along  quiet  roads  or  city 
streets  were  hailed  from  other  cars  by  fleeting  highwaymen 
or  highwaywomen;  or  they  discovered  with  their  search 
lights  somber  gentlemen  (or  ladies)  whose  watchword  was 
becoming  a  national  greeting — "Put  'em  up!" 

It  seemed  as  if  one  half  the  world  had  its  hands  in  the  air 
while  the  other  half  went  through  its  pockets,  cash  drawers, 
suitcases,  or  mail  pouches. 

Los  Angeles,  as  one  of  the  busiest  cities  going,  naturally 
had  its  share  of  this  industry;  furthermore,  its  thronged 
streets  were  superior  to  every  other  city's  in  the  number  of 
people  killed  and  maimed  by  the  floods  of  automobiles. 

Mem  thought  of  Los  Angeles  as  the  missionary  thinks  of 
Benin,  Somaliland,  Milan,  or  Shanghai,  or  some  other  center 
of  crime,  though  none  of  the  foreign  murder  mills  has  ever 
approached  the  American  grist. 

In  the  Times  she  discovered  a  number  of  suggestive 
deaths.  Here  was  the  story  of  a  man  who  slipped  into  the 
swollen  Colorado  River,  which  was  running  one  of  its  annual 
amoks.  Here  were  a  hundred  people  in  Colorado  State 
swept  out  of  their  homes  and  drowned  by  a  torrent.  Here 
was  a  rich  man  whose  neck  was  broken  in  an  overturned  car ; 
here  were  a  score  effaced  in  a  collision  between  an  auto  bus 
and  an  electric  train.  Here  was  a  New-Yorker  shot  dead 
in  his  pajamas  as  he  sat  with  a  lapful  of  morning  letters. 
Here  was  a  man  found  buried  in  his  own  cellar;  fcere  was  a 


SOULS   FOR   SAVE  103 

mid- Western  gentleman  for  whose  murder  his  wife  and  his 
stepdaughter  were  being  tried,  the  allegation  being  that 
they  had  filled  him  with  arsenic  taken  from  fly  paper. 
Here  was  a  man  who  hired  a  hobo  to  play  a  practical  joke 
on  his  wife  and  pretend  to  hold  them  up  in  their  door 
way;  then  the  amazing  dramatist  shot  the  hobo  dead, 
shot  his  wife  dead,  and  announced  that  he  had  taken  part 
in  a  pistol  duel  with  a  highwayman.  The  cynical  police 
found  a  few  flaws  in  his  glib  story  and  wrung  a  confession 
from  him. 

He  was  a  very  religious  young  man,  too,  and  superior  to 
all  small  vices.  And  the  jury  at  his  first  trial  disagreed  as 
to  his  guilt,  since  he  repudiated  his  confession.  A  second 
jury  found  him  guilty,  but  he  pleaded  insanity  and  deferred 
the  penalty.  Altogether  an  original  genius  in  crime.  Mem 
envied  him  his  ingenuity. 

There  were  instances  enough  and  too  many  of  death's 
activities  in  the  newspaper.  Here  was  an  aviator  doing  a 
moving-picture  stunt  whose  ship  caught  fire  and  brought 
him  down  burned  to  a  crisp.  Here  was  a  man  killed  in  his 
automobile  by  a  big  tree  falling  over  him. 

There  was  such  an  embarrassment  of  riches  that  Mem 
could  not  select  a  single  method  of  doing  away  with  Mr. 
Woodville.  She  forgot  him  utterly  for  a  while  in  a  page 
devoted  to  the  gossip  of  moving-picture  studios.  She  saw 
that  Robina  Teele  and  Tom  Holby  had  come  back  to  Holly 
wood  from  a  dash  to  New  York  for  local  color,  and  would 
soon  be  going  out  again  "on  location,"  wherever  that  was. 
She  saw  that  Viva  d'Artois  and  her  husband  had  reopened 
their  beautiful  bungalow  in  Edendale.  She  saw  that  Miriam 
Yore  had  arrived  and  taken  a  palatial  house  for  her  stay. 
Maurice  Maeterlinck  had  come  out  on  a  special  train.  Many 
English  men  and  women  of  fame  were  on  their  way,  and 
herds  of  authors  who,  being  American,  were  unimportant. 
Domestic  goods  are  always  shoddy,  and  imported  elegant. 

Mem  reverted  to  her  plot.  She  had  her  mourning  all 
ready  to  put  on.  But  here  was  a  new  complication.  If 
she  arrived  in  Yuma  as  a  widow  she  must  don  her  mourn 
ing  in  the  train.  She  would  have  to  retire  to^  the  narrow 


io4  SOULS    FOR    SALfE 

cell  of  the  women's  room  and  make  the  change  there.  That 
was  inconvenient,  but  not  impossible,  It  was  the  only 
thing  to  do. 

Yet  if  she  went  in  a  maid  and  out  a  widow,  people  might 
notice  the  change  and  wonder;  for  she  had  been  well  observed 
by  the  other  passengers.  A  few  of  them  had  remarked  that 
it  was  hot,  or  asked  her  if  it  were  not  hot.  "Pretty  hot, 
what?"  one  woman  had  said.  Mem  had  thought  peevishly 
what  a  funny  thing  it  was  the  way  folks  used  "pretty" — 
"pretty  hot"  meant  "hideous  hot." 

She  knew  that  women  were  like  cameras  for  snapshotting 
other  women's  clothes  at  a  glance  and  remembering  them 
like  a  photograph.  Men  didn't  notice  such  things  much; 
yet  men  had  noticed  her — two  men  particularly ;  one  of  them 
a  flashy,  impudent  creature  with  hard,  exploring  eyes 
that  fairly  nosed  her  like  a  pig's  snout;  the  other  a  lonely 
deer-eyed  thing  pleading  for  pity  with  a  woman-hungry 
stare. 

Mem  had  a  flash  of  unusual  cynicism  toward  the  mo 
ralities.  Why  is  it  that  we  feel  so  sorry  for  the  loneliness  of 
the  timid  man  and  so  disgusted  with  the  loneliness  of  the 
bold  man?  The  loneliness  must  hurt  both  of  them  about 
the  same.  But  she  did  not  dwell  on  the  thought.  Humanity 
is  never  going  to  give  the  sympathy  to  the  hyena  that  it 
wastes  on  the  more  destructive  rabbit. 

What  settled  Mem's  debate  was  the  realization  that  if 
she  donned  her  crape  on  the  train  it  would  cause  a  stir  among 
the  people  in  whose  flying  parlor  she  had  sat  for  seven 
hours  or  so.  And  some  of  them  would  doubtless  be  getting 
off  at  Yuma. 

She  wondered  if  somebody  would  come  up  to  her  at  the 
station,  as  at  Tucson,  and  announce  himself  as  the  deputy 
of  her  father.  She  hoped  not.  He  could  hardly  have  divined 
that  she  was  bound  for  Yuma.  Yet  she  could  not  feel  sure. 
For  all  she  knew,  the  first  person  she  met  might  be  somebody 
from  Calverly. 

Another  point  decided  her.  If  she  wrote  to  her  father 
that  she  had  left  Tucson  as  a  wife  and  reached  Yuma  as  a 
widow,  it  would  be  necessary  to  push  her  husband  off  the 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  105 

train  or  wreck  the  train  or  something;    and  that  would  be 
hard  to  verify. 

There  were  other  reasons  for  giving  herself  a  little  longer 
experience  of  wedded  bliss.  This  marriage  was  for  a  purpose. 

She  grew  frantic  with  indecision.  The  train  seemed  to  be 
exerting  itself  to  fling  her  into  Yuma  before  she  could  make 
up  her  mind.  Nothing  was  easier  than  to  tell  a  lie,  but, 
great  Heavens !  how  difficult  it  was  to  foresee  all  the  things 
that  would  happen  to  it  as  it  went  along  accumulating  com 
plications.  Like  other  works  of  art,  a  lie  must  be  all  things 
to  all  men  or  be  strong  enough  to  endure  their  idiosyncrasies 
and  their  attacks. 

Doctor  Bretherick  had  told  her  to  hold  her  head  up  and 
run — yet  not  to  run.  He  had  thereupon  shipped  her  West 
to  a  land  of  strangers;  yet  she  could  neither  break  away 
from  the  ties  at  home  nor  break  through  the  nets  ahead  of 
her.  She  was  running  as  fast  as  she  could,  but  she  had  leg 
irons  on.  She  had  not  left  pursuit  behind,  and  the  path 
ahead  was  all  brambles  and  pitfalls. 

The  train  went  whooping  into  a  low,  loosely  built  town 
as  she  oscillated  from  one  plan  to  another.    A  hoarse  voice 
bawled :    ' '  Yew — my !    Yew — my ! ' ' 
8 


CHAPTER  XVII 

NOBODY  stepped  forward  to  call  Mem  by  name.  But 
she  almost  wished  that  somebody  had,  for  she  was  in 
a  foreign  world  indeed. 

The  town  had  nothing  of  Tucson's  quality.  It  was  still  a 
frontier  post  in  the  eternal  battle  with  the  savage  desert. 
Nearly  a  century  and  a  half  ago  Spanish  missionaries  and 
soldiers  had  been  massacred  here  by  the  Yuma  Indians. 

Indians  were  all  about  the  station  now,  and  they  frightened 
the  girl  who  knew  of  them  only  as  demons  of  cruelty.  The 
heat  was  savage,  too. 

There  is  a  saying  that  "only  a  sheet  of  paper  stands  between 
Yuma  and  hell."  Mem  could  have  believed  it  as  her  thin 
soles  winced  at  the  oven-lid  platform,  and  the  sun  bored 
through  her  hat  and  her  sweaty  hair  into  her  very  brain. 

She  was  solicited  to  go  to  the  hotel,  but  she  could  hardly 
afford  such  splendor.  She  inquired  about  a  boarding  house. 
The  baggageman  recommended  one,  and  she  rode  thither, 
fearing  to  trust  herself  to  wander  about  the  sun-smitten 
streets. 

They  were  torrid,  those  streets,  but  fascinating,  since 
everything  was  foreign  to  her  experience.  The  shabbiest 
adobe  hut  was  picturesque  to  her  because  cooked  mud  was 
new  to  her;  the  "stick-in-the-mud"  houses  made  of  plas 
tered  willow  poles  were  artistic,  somehow. 

Date  palms  and  mesquite  trees  and  fuzzy  cottonwoods, 
pepper  trees  and  domesticated  cacti,  made  her  cry  out  with 
delight. 

But  the  Indians  were  the  main  charm.  They  gave  the 
dusty,  dreary  town  a  festival  look.  They  reminded  Mem 
of  the  days  when  circuses  had  come  to  Calverly.  She  had 
never  been  permitted  to  go  to  them,  and  it  had  hurt  her 
father's  confidence  in  her  when  she  showed  a  desire  to  see 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  107 

the  free  parades.  But  now  she  was  inside  the  circus,  part 
of  the  troupe.  She  expected  to  see  an  old  stagecoach  swing 
into  the  street,  pursued  by  shooting  Apaches. 

Yuma  was  filled  with  Indians.  An  Indian  school  was 
there,  and  a  reservation.  The  Indians  had  their  own  shops 
and  farms.  They  were  tamed  now  and  no  longer  matched 
torture  and  treachery  with  the  soldiers  and  the  pioneers. 

They  were  subdued  to  agriculture  and  petty  commerce. 
Their  barbaric  souls  found  expression  only  in  raw,  flamboy 
ant  colors.  The  squaws  went  down  the  street  in  cheap 
fabrics,  high  in  the  neck  and  low  in  the  hem.  They  wTore 
mainly  blue-and-white  Mother  Hubbards  aided  and  abetted 
by  capes  of  colors  that  massacred  one  another  and  tortured 
the  beholder.  The  hot  wind  flapped  their  clothes  about 
them  with  a  ruthless  draftsmanship  that  emphasized  what 
it  concealed.  There  was  no  question  as  to  the  conformation 
of  these  squat,  stodgy  figures. 

The  red  fillets  about  their  brows  would  have  been  more 
effective  if  the  faces  beneath  had  been  more  attractive  or 
the  lawless  hair  better  kempt. 

Even  the  young  squaws  had  little  to  commend  them  to 
admiration,  and  the  contrast  between  their  gold-crowned 
teeth  and  their  shoeless  feet  was  not  to  their  advantage. 

The  men  were  better  looking  and  better  carried.  They 
were  mainly  tall  and  lithe  and  haughty.  They  had  also  a 
passion  for  color,  for  bandannas  and  loud  shirts.  They  wore 
their  hair  longer  than  the  squaws  wore  theirs. 

Tribal  custom  forbade  them  to  braid  it  and  it  fell  in  long 
strands  sometimes  to  their  waists,  with  no  confinement 
except  perhaps  a  piece  of  colored  string. 

Mem  could  hardly  believe  her  eyes  when  a  long,  lean  buck 
flew  past  on  a  bicycle,  his  hair  streaming  out  like  a  young 
girl's. 

She  passed  one  boarding  house  in  whose  front  yard  was  a 
signboard  boasting  the  stormlessness  of  the  region: 

Free  Board  and  Lodging 

Every  Day  in  the  Year  that 

The  Sun  Don't  Shine 


io8  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

In  such  a  persecuting  heat  as  this  Mem  thought  the  legend 
on  the  sign  more  of  a  threat  than  a  promise. 

When  she  reached  the  boarding  house  selected  for  her,  she 
rejoiced  at  the  sight  of  shade.  But  here  lurked  another 
landlady  to  be  lied  to.  Mrs.  Drissett  greeted  Mem  hos 
pitably  and  asked,  "What  name,  please?" 

Mem  managed  to  check  the  name  "Steddon"  coming  up 
her  throat  and  changed  it  hastily  to  "Mrs.  Woodville." 

"Your  husband  ain't  with  you?" 

"Er,  no.  He — he's  coming  along  later."  And  now  her 
heart  sank.  How  could  she  kill  off  Mr.  Woodville  here 
when  he  had  not  yet  arrived?  How  was  she  to  arrive 
him? 

"You'll  want  a  double  room,  then,"  said  Mrs.  Drissett. 

"Yes,  of  course — er — yes." 

And  now  she  had  to  pay  extra  money  for  a  ghost ! 

As  she  moved  up  to  her  allotted  room  the  sad-eyed  man 
she  had  noted  on  the  train  came  up  and  asked  for  "  'com- 
modations." 

It  was  well  that  Mem  had  not  put  on  her  mourning.  She 
would  have  been  caught  indeed.  She  rested  in  her  darkened 
room  to  escape  the  afternoon  blaze,  but  when  she  came  down 
to  supper  she  was  placed  next  to  a  woman  who  frightened 
her  worse  than  a  tarantula,  by  the  petrifying  remark : 

"Small  world,  ain't  it,  Miz  Woodville?  My  husband's 
folks  on  his  mother's  side  was  Woodvilles.  What  part  of 
the  country  does  your  husband's  family  hail  from?" 

Mem  choked  sincerely  on  a  bread  crumb,  but  prolonged 
the  spasm  while  she  tried  to  plot  an  answer  to  this  perilous 
question.  She  had  never  expected  to  be  cross-examined  on 
her  husband's  family  or  habitat,  and  had  never  equipped 
him  with  either. 

So  she  excused  herself  and  left  the  table,  strangled  in 
throat  and  mind. 

She  could  not  endure  the  jail  of  her  room,  and  stole  out 
for  a  walk.  The  desert  twilight  was  turning  the  tin  roof  of 
the  sky  into  a  heavenly  ceiling  where  invisible  spirits  were 
wielding  brushes  of  divine  splendor. 

The  town's  one  ambitious  building,  the  courthouse,  broke 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  109 

the  horizon  with  a  cupola  that  was  a  palette  of  reflected 
pigments. 

She  wandered  down  along  the  swollen  Colorado,  a  stream 
of  blood  in  the  sunset.  An  old  stern-wheeled  steamer  fought 
its  way  up  from  the  California  gulf  noisily  and  ominously, 
like  some  primeval  water  beast  returning  to  its  lair  in  the 
Grand  Canon. 

The  mountains  in  the  distance  were  piled  up  in  mournful 
dunes  against  a  sea  of  gleaming  light. 

But  she  was  afraid  of  the  Indians  slipping  noiselessly  about 
on  innocent  errands.  She  could  not  believe  that  they  were 
not  planning  a  massacre.  This  was  the  old  Apache  country. 
Yet  the  Indians  and  the  Mexicans,  whose  children  played 
about  as  naked  as  the  other  pigs,  were  not  dangerous 
to  her.  They  made  little  trouble  over  an  unauthorized 
child  or  two. 

She  hurried  back  to  the  main  street  where  the  Indians 
were  mere  loafers  and  small-town  sports,  smoking  cigarettes 
and  ogling  the  giggling  girls  in  the  evening  mood  of  other 
small  towns. 

She  was  faint  with  hunger  and  entered  a  drug  store  for 
refreshment.  She  bought  herself  a  nut  sundae  as  at  Calverly. 
On  either  side  of  her  was  an  Indian  brave  treating  an  Indian 
girl  to  the  same  pale-face  medicine.  The  braves  wore  head 
dresses  of  gaudy  color — almost  as  gaudy  as  the  shirts  on  the 
young  white  beaux  who  were  taking  their  sweethearts  to 
the  movies. 

Mem  followed  the  crowd  and  paid  "two  bits"  to  sit  with 
the  aristocrats,  while  the  Greasers,  the  Hopis,  and  Navajos 
went  in  at  the  other  door  for  ten  cents. 

The  Indians  had  learned  to  spoon  in  the  dim  light,  and 
they  laughed  at  the  low  comedy  and  sighed  at  the  low 
pathos.  They  could  read  the  first  universal  language,  and 
romance  was  warming  their  dreary  lives. 

Mem  smiled  to  think  of  her  father's  wrath  at  the  movies 
as  the  weapons  of  Satan,  for  she  could  not  but  realize  how 
much  safer  from  temptation  these  spectators  were  here 
watching  the  unfolding  of  almost  any  imaginable  fictions 
than  they  would  be  wandering  in  stealthy  couples  along  the 


no  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

gloomy  river  banks  or  left  to  the  mercy  of  their  own  devices 
in  the  dark  of  their  wretched  homes. 

She  blushed  suddenly  with  the  thought  that  if  she  and 
Elwood  had  spent  that  Sunday  evening  in  a  moving-picture 
house,  instead  of  mooning  on  the  home  porch,  she  might 
have  escaped  this  shameful  exile. 

She  went  back  to  her  boarding  house  relieved  a  little  from 
the  monomania  of  her  own  problems  by  watching  the  weaving 
and  unweaving  of  pictured  problems. 

When  she  reached  her  new  home  she  found  the  yard 
full  of  beds,  and  most  of  the  beds  occupied  by  a  sprawling 
populace  with  hardly  so  much  as  a  sheet  to  mask  its  night- 
wear. 

She  stole  through  the  camp  to  her  own  room,  and  found  it 
bedless.  She  stood  at  her  door  bewildered. 

The  woman  who  had  frightened  her  away  from  her  dinner 
by  her  genealogical  interest  in  the  Woodville  tribe  appeared 
ghostlike  in  nightgown  and  a  toga'd  sheet  and,  seeing  her 
perplexity,  explained  the  custom  of  the  country. 

"You'll  suffercate  if  you  try  to  sleep  in  your  own  room, 
honey.  Get  into  your  nightgown  and  bring  your  bedclo'es 
down  with  you,  like  I'm  doin'.  Your  bed  is  in  the  yard 
next  to  mine.  You'll  sleep  good  and  feel  right  refreshed  in 
the  mornin'." 

There  was  nothing  for  Mem  to  do  but  follow  suit.  To  one 
who  had  never  seen  a  bathing  beach  or  gone  in  bathing 
undress  among  a  crowd,  the  ordeal  was  terrifying.  She 
dreaded  it  as  an  early  Christian  martyr  might  have  recoiled 
when  the  Romans  tore  off  her  clothes  and  thrust  her  into  the 
arena;  as  those  three  Quaker  wrcmen  must  have  shuddered 
when  the  good  Puritans  of  Boston  stripped  them  to  the 
waist,  tied  them  to  the  tail  of  a  cart,  and  lashed  their  bare 
backs  through  the  snowy  streets  of  eleven  towns — for 
their  souls'  sakes;  just  as  the  good  Puritans  of  1920  lashed 
the  bare  reputations  of  the  moving-picture  producers  for 
the  good  of  the  community. 

Fortunately  for  Mem's  tranquillity,  her  Woodvillian 
relative  by  marriage  was  already  asleep  and  asnore  when 
she  slipped  wraithlike  out  into  the  yard  and,  after  a  pause 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  in 

at  the  brink,  ran  to  her  bed  and  crawled  under  a  tent  of 
mosquito  netting  and  nothing  else. 

She  lay  staring  up  at  familiar  stars  in  a  most  unfamiliar 
world,  and  shame  and  loneliness  smothered  her,  as  she 
smothered  her  sobs  in  her  pillow  lest  she  wake  the  neighbors. 
The  hot  breath  from  her  own  lungs  was  cooler  than  the 
night  breeze,  and  the  bed  beneath  her  was  so  warm  that 
modesty  battled  almost  vainly  with  nature  to  keep  as  much 
as  a  sheet  over  her. 

She  wondered  why  she  had  come  to  this  Gehenna  where 
she  did  not  purge  herself  of  sin,  but  committed  more  and 
more  sin.  She  wondered  why  anybody  was  here  at  all. 
Having  learned  to  distrust  her  own  wild  capabilities  for 
passionate  impulse,  she  wondered  how  long  she  would  endure 
the  penance. 

Here  she  lay,  tossing  like  a  frying  fish  in  a  skillet,  trying 
to  atone  for  a  moment's  rapture  with  a  lifetime  of  woe, 
while  other  women  had  glorious  times  and  fame  and  luxury ; 
and  did  what  they  pleased,  and  were  fawned  upon  by  the 
whole  world.  That  Miriam  Yore!  She  got  ten  thousand 
a  week  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  people  said  she  had  had  two 
children  outside  the  law!  Was  she  popular  in  spite  of  that 
fact?  or  because  of  it? 

In  such  insane  brooding  Mem  fell  asleep  at  length. 

She  fell  asleep  so  late  that  she  slept  on  far  past  the  day 
break,  and  when  the  sun's  rays  finally  flailed  her  eyelids 
open  she  sat  up  with  a  start,  thinking  that  some  one  had 
moved  the  house  out  from  under  and  over  her. 

Her  darting  eyes  met  the  bleary  gaze  of  the  sad-eyed  man, 
lolling  a  few  beds  away. 

He  smiled  and  drawled,  "Good  mawn'n'."  This  was 
really  quite  too  incredible.  She  did  not  answer  him,  but 
hid  under  the  sheet  until  she  was  sure  that  he  had  scrambled 
out  and,  wrapping  the  drapery  of  his  couch  about  him,  had 
marched  into  the  house. 

Then  she  gathered  up  her  bedclothes  and  ran. 

She  bathed  standing  up  by  a  washbowl  on  a  washstand,  and 
the  cold  water  was  already  so  warm,  her  flesh  already  so  ting 
ling  with  the  early  heat,  that  she  dreaded  to  get  into  clothes. 


ii2  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

And,  of  course,  she  was  suffering  nausea  every  morning; 
her  body  was  as  sick  of  the  complexities  of  life  as  her  mind. 
The  relentless  machineries  within  herself  seemed  as  bent 
upon  her  punishment  as  the  relentless  machineries  of  human 
society  without.  Her  soul  stood  aghast  between  the  perse 
cutions  of  the  devil  inside  her  and  the  deep  sea  of  the  people 
outside. 

She  grew  so  distraught  with  trying  to  justify  the  peculiar 
ways  of  God  to  man,  and  especially  to  woman,  that  she 
felt  afraid  of  her  own  rebellious  soul.  She  feared  her  room 
and  her  self,  and  ran  down  to  breakfast. 

She  was  glad  to  see  that  the  old  woman  who  asked  about 
the  Woodvilles  was  not  in  her  place.  But  she  came  in  later, 
and  with  the  kindliest  spirit  took  up  the  question  again. 

"I  was  askin'  you  about  the  Woodvilles  when  you  had  a 
chokin'  fit  last  evenin',  and  you  didn't  git  to  tell  me  about 
your  husband.  I'm  a  Rodman,  myself — or  was  till  I  mar 
ried  Mr.  Sloat.  But  his  mother  was  a  Woodville  like  I  told 
you,  and  finer  folks  never  was.  It  would  be  funny  if  you 
and  me  was  related,  kind  of,  that  away,  wouldn't  it?" 

"Wouldn't  it?"  Mem  echoed;  and,  like  Echo,  contributed 
nothing  helpful  to  the  conversation. 

"Just  where  did  your  husband  come  from?" 

"I  don't  know!" 

"You  don't  know!" 

"No." 

"But  he  must  have  come  from  somewhere." 

"No,  he  didn't.     That  is — he  was  an  orphan." 

"But  even  orphans  have  folks.  What  part  of  the  country 
was  he  born  in?" 

"He  doesn't  remember." 

"Land  alive!  child,  are  you  tryin'  to  have  fun  with  me? 
You're  not  ashamed  of  the  Woodvilles,  are  you? " 

Naturally,  anyone  would  have  said,  "No!  Oh,  no!"  So 
Mem,  being  in  an  unnatural  frenzy,  answered,  "Yes." 

This  stumped  Mrs.  Sloat  completely.  It  was  her  turn  to 
choke.  When  she  regained  the  vocal  use  of  her  windpipe  she 
began  again,  half  to  herself: 

"So  you're  ashamed  of  the  Woodvilles,  eh?    Well,  well! 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  113 

Who'd  V  thought  it?  Still,  o'  course,  there's  a  black  sheep 
in  all  families.  Where'd  you  say  your  husband—  Oh,  he 
was  an  orphan,  wa'n't  he?  I'd  like  to  talk  to  him  when  he 
gits  here.  You're  expectin'  him,  I  believe  you  said." 

"Did  I?" 

"Well,  didn't  you?" 

" Maybe.     I'm  liable  to  say  anything  when  it's  so  hot." 

"Say,  you'd  better  go  lay  down.  You're  talkin'  awful 
funny.  Go  out  and  set  on  the  corner  the  porch.  They's 
usurally  a  breeze  there  if  they's  any  anywhurs." 

"Thanks,  I  will." 

Mem  had  a  keen  desire  to  go  to  her  room  and  laugh 
uproariously.  She  had  found  a  madwoman's  glee  in  bewilder 
ing  old  Mrs.  Sloat  with  her  evasive  answers.  But  in  her 
room  her  insane  self  would  be  waiting  to  nag  her  with  more 
baffling  questions  than  Mrs.  Sloat's.  So  she  -went  to  the 
porch  and  sat  in  the  rocker  at  the  corner  and  found  a  little 
nepenthe  in  watching  the  tremulous  beauty  of  a  pepper  tree, 
all  soft  foliage  and  shadow.  It  seemed  to  be  draped  in  old 
shawls  with  embroideries  of  deep  red. 

By  and  by  the  sad-eyed  man  came  clumping  along  the 
porch  and  took  a  chair.  He  was  evidently  pining  for  some 
one  to  talk  to,  but  he  nearly  lost  his  audience  on  the  first 
question : 

"'Scuse  me,  ma'am,  but  landlady  says  your  name  is 
Woodville.  That  right  ? ' ' 

Mem  nodded,  and  her  heart  began  to  beat  her  side  so 
hard  that  she  wondered  if  he  could  not  see  it  leap  under  her 
light  waist.  She  made  ready  to  escape  again,  but  he  allayed 
her  panic: 

"Reason  I  ast  was,  I  knowed  a  man  o'  that  name — no, 
dadgone  it!  his  name  was  Woodward.  That's  right.  His 
name  was  Woodward — or — no,  it  was — well,  anyways,  it 
prob'ly  wasn't  his  real  name  at  that.  I  called  him  Woodie 
— or  Woodhead."  He  sat  chuckling  to  himself  over  his 
reminiscences.  "Woodie  was  a  nice  enough  feller.  Not 
much  sense,  but  meant  all  right,  I  reckon.  Many's  the 
mountain  him  and  I  prospected,  the  Choc'luts,  Sooper- 
stitions,  all  of  'em  round  these  parts.  See  that  big  peak  up 


ii4  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

there  all  by  itself  like  a  'Gyptian  obalisk?  That's  old 
Picacho.  Used  to  be  so  rich  in  gold  that  a  miner  who  didn't 
wash  three  hund'ed  dollars  of  gold  a  day  was  fired  for  a 
no-' count.  Now  it's  all  abandoned,  towns  and  camps. 
There's  gold  there  yit,  but  it's  sure  hell  to  find. 

"Well,  this  Woodville,  or  whatever  it  was,  seems  like  him 
and  I  went  over  every  inch  of  this  country  with  a  pick  and  a 
spyglass.  We  like  to  died  a  dozen  times — water  give  out. 
Once  we  got  to  a  water  hole  so  deep  down  our  rope  wouldn't 
just  quite  reach  it,  and  we  couldn't  climb  down.  There 
was  a  big  rattlesnake  there  at  that.  We  was  both  black  in 
the  mouth.  One  of  our  burros  had  fell  off  a  ledge  and  died, 
and  the  other  'n  shook  off  his  pack  and  bolted.  And  we  was 
too  weak  to  chase  him.  Then  Woodie  went  plumb  crazy. 
He  thro  wed  away  his  blankit  and  his  clo'es  and  took  off  his 
boots  and  flung  'em  down  the  water  hole  at  the  snake,  and 
would  've  jumped  after  'em,  only  I  helt  on  to  him.  I  was 
some  feeble  m'self,  but  I  got  him  roped  and  tied. 

"Then  he  cert'ny  give  me  and  Gawd  about  the  best  cussin* 
out  either  of  us  ever  got,  and  we  both  been  swore  at  consid- 
'able.  Well,  my  brain  begun  to  dry  up  and  go  crazy,  too. 
I  was  startin'  to  throw  away  my  things  when  a  prospector 
found  us.  He  had  water  and  a  string  of  burros,  and  he 
brought  us  in.  After  that  I  told  Woodie  I  was  goin'  to  keep 
away  from  the  desert.  He  laughed  hisself  sick,  and  says  he, 
'Bodlin' — my  name's  Bodlin — 'Bodlin,  I'll  bet  you  fifty 
dollars  you  come  back  before  the  year's  out.'  I  took  him  up, 
and  I  lost  and  won.  Woodie  went  in  again  and  stayed." 

"He  stayed?"  Mem  mumbled.  "You  mean  he's  still 
there?" 

"He  shore  is,  Miz  Woodville!  When  we  say  a  feller 
'stayed'  in  the  desert  we  mean  he  ain't  never  comin'  back 
at  tall.  There  was  a  piece  in  the  Tucson  paper  about  Woodie. 
Pore  old  skate,  he  went  back  once  too  often." 

"Did  he  die  of  thirst?" 

"Not  him.  Not  this  time.  That  ole  desert  has  more 
ways  'n  one  of  eatin*  you  up.  It  was  Woodie's  luck,  after 
dyin'  of  thirst  a  hund'ed  times,  to  git  drownded.  Yessum, 
the  desert  is  fuller  of  jokes  than  anybody  you  know.  Take 


SOULS   FOR   SALE  115 

them  miradges,  for  instance;  when  you'd  give  your  soul  for 
a  spoonful  of  wet  scum  you  see  a  lake  and  a  river  and  a 
waterfall  playin'  away  just  ahead  of  you.  It  ain't  there,  and 
you  know  it.  And  yet  you  know  it  is  and  you  just  can't 
he'p  pushin'  on  to  see  if  it  ain't  there  this  time. 

"But  Woodie  he  made  his  camp  in  a  dry  arroyo  bed,  and 
durin'  the  night  they  was  a  cloudburst,  and  he  must  'a'  been 
hit  by  a  regular  river  before  he  knowed  what  struck  him. 
They  found  him  in  a  pile  of  brush  the  river  had  gethered  up. 
When  they  found  him  it  was  as  dry  as  ever  and  his  canteen 
was  empty. 

"And  now  I'm  forty  dollars  ahead,  for  I  can't  pay  him 
his  bet.  I  was  braggin'  about  how  smart  I  was  to  git  out 
and  stay  out.  But  here  I  am  goin'  in  again  as  soon  as  I  can 
git  a  couple  of  burros  and  a  few  things.  Once  the  desert  gits 
you,  it's  got  you.  It's  like  some  of  these  women  you  hate 
and  can't  git  red  of.  They  don't  love  you  and  they  rob 
you  and  torture  you  and  you  know  they'll  kill  you  some 
day,  but  you  just  can't  quit  'em  for  keeps." 

Mem  thought  a  long  time  before  she  spoke.  Then  she 
said: 

"Do  women  ever  go  into  the  desert,  Mr.  Bodlin?" 

' '  Sometimes ;  not  often .    Sometimes . ' ' 

A  wild  look  came  into  her  eyes  and  she  nodded  unwittingly. 
The  vassal  of  the  desert  said: 

"Was  you  thinkin'  of  goin'  in?" 

She  smiled  curiously,  and  even  he  who  knew  so  little  of 
women  read  a  yes  in  her  smile. 

"With  your  husband?"  he  mumbled. 

She  smiled  again. 

"He's  a  mighty  lucky  man,  a  mighty  lucky  man!  The 
desert  is  a  tough  place  on  a  pirty  little  lady.  It  '11  lose  you 
that  white  skin  and  them  soft  hands.  But  it  would  be  a 
grand  thing  for  a  man  to  have  a  woman  to  talk  to  and  to 
take  care  of — to  share  a  canteen  with  and — to  find  gold  for. 
Or,  if  you  didn't  find  gold,  you'd  have  her.  Under  the  stars 
and  in  the  cool  of  some  of  them  caves — and  they's  canons 
up  there  where  you  find  palm  trees  growin',  like  you  was 
back  in  the  Garden  of  Eden." 


u6  SOULS   FOR   SALE 

He  was  fairly  writhing  with  his  vision  of  such  a  pilgrimage. 
He  sighed  like  furnace: 

"Your  husband's  shore  one  lucky  man.  Tell  you  what, 
Miz  Woodville,  if  you  ever  git  tired  of  him,  just  lea'  me 
know  and  I'll  push  him  off  a  clift  for  you  or  punch  a  hole  in 
his  canteen.  Anyways,  I'll  be  on  the  watch  for  you.  I 
can't  give  you  no  address.  We  don't  git  mail  very  reg'lar 
on  the  desert,  but  everybody  knows  Bodlin.  Gosh  all  hem 
lock!  but  your  husband's  shore  one  lucky  man!" 

He  got  up  and  walked  away,  as  if  to  escape  the  temptation 
to  covet  his  neighbor's  wife.  The  girl  was  so  beautiful  in 
his  eyes  that  he  would  have  been  ready  to  commit  murder 
to  get  her  if  that  would  fetch  her.  His  visions  of  her  com 
panionship  were  too  fiercely  vivid  to  be  borne  in  her  demure 
presence. 

But  it  was  Mem  who  was  going  to  do  the  murdering.  She 
had  found  the  way  to  be  rid  of  her  husband  for  the  satisfac 
tion  of  her  people. 

Now  if  she  could  only  find  a  way  to  be  rid  of  herself. 

And  that  way  came  to  her  before  the  long  day  had  burned 
itself  away.  She  had  hidden  from  the  sun  in  her  room. 
The  drawn  curtains  kept  out  the  light  and  the  sun-steeped 
wind ;  but  the  still  air  inside  the  room  seemed  to  have  thorns. 
It  stung  her  flesh  with  nettles  where  she  lay  supine  on  her 
bed  in  as  little  garb  as  her  schooled  modesty  would  permit. 

She  heard  two  waitresses  talking  in  the  dining  room 
below  as  they  set  the  tables  for  supper. 

"Who  was  that  letter  you  got,  from?  some  feller ?" 

"Nah!  It  was  from  a  lady  up  to  Palm  Springs,  askin'  me 
was  I  comin'  back  up  there  this  season?" 

"Are  you?" 

"Nah!  Too  quiet  for  me.  Yuma  ain't  no  merry-go- 
round,  but  Palm  Springs — my  Gawd !  It's  just  a  little  spot 
of  shadder  in  the  desert.  Nice  and  cool  in  the  season,  but 
what  does  cool  get  you  if  you're  cut  off  from  all  the  world? 
Would  ya  b'lieve  ut,  there  'ain't  even  a  movin'  pitcher 
there.  When  I  want  to  hide  from  the  worl'  I'll  crawl  into 
Palm  Springs,  but  not  before." 

"This  lady  offer  you  a  job?" 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  117 

"  Yes.  She's  on  her  knees  to  me.  Mrs.  Randies  her  name 
is.  Husband's  got  a  ranch.  Nice  little  hotel  there,  too, 
with  jobs  goin'  beggin';  but  not  for  me,  thank  you.  I'm 
through  with  them  retreats.  I'm  tryin'  to  work  my  way  to 
a  real  city.  Gimme  folks  and  plenty  of  'em.  How'd  you 
like  to  go  there  and  take  my  job  at  Randles's." 

The  other  voice  moaned:  "Me?  Not  much.  I  run 
away  from  home  to  git  love  and  excitement,  and  look 
where  I've  landed!  My  Gawd!  but  I  wisht  I  was  back  in 
Wichita!" 

The  voices  died  in  a  clatter  of  plates  and  knives  and  forks. 
There  was  melancholy  and  thwarted  ambition  everywhere, 
evidently. 

Mem  had  never  heard  of  Palm  Springs,  but  she  was  look 
ing  for  just  such  a  place.  And  a  ranch!  She  had  always 
wanted  to  see  a  ranch. 

The  heat  here  was  like  a  madness  upon  her,  but  most  of 
all  she  abhorred  this  eternal  facing  of  questions.  Mrs.  Sloat 
was  a  nuisance,  a  menace.  Writing  letters  home  and  getting 
letters  from  home  had  become  an  intolerable  burden  on  her 
soul. 

She  wanted  to  get  away  from  everybody  that  had  ever 
known  her.  She  wanted  to  find  some  deep,  dark  cave.  She 
was  the  prey  already  of  the  instinct  that  Doctor  Bretherick 
had  spoken  of,  the  instinct  to  crawl  away  and  hide  during 
the  long,  ugly  phase  ahead  of  her  and  the  fearful  climax  at 
the  end  of  it. 

There  was  a  blaze  of  mutiny  in  her  heart  against  the  whole 
business  of  her  life.  She  understood  why  Bodlin's  over 
loaded,  overdriven  burro  had  kicked  off  its  pack  and  bolted. 
This  pack  of  lies  that  she  was  carrying  and  adding  to  at 
every  step  was  bound  to  crush  her  sooner  or  later.  Why  be 
a  burro  for  other  people's  burdens?  It  would  profit  her 
none.  What  reward  could  she  hope  for? 

Heat  and  fatigue  whipped  her  into  hysteria.  Her  soul 
vomited  up  all  the  precepts  it  had  been  fed  upon.  She  found 
energy  enough  for  one  last  desperate  letter  home.  Then 
she  would  declare  her  soul  bankrupt  and  face  the  world  free 
of  responsibilities  to  the  past. 


n8  SOULS    FOR   SALE 

DARLING  MAMMA  AND  PAPA, — By  now  you  have  probably  ceased 
to  be  surprised  at  anything  I  do.  You'll  think  I've  gone  clean 
crazy  and  I  guess  I  have,  but  as  long  as  I'm  getting  better  and 
happier  every  day  you  won't  mind. 

I've  been  too  busy  to  write  you  all  about  John  as  I  promised. 
He  is  out  here  scouting  for  a  famous  mine  and  is  going  prospecting 
for  it  right  away.  It  is  a  famous  lost  mine  that  got  abandoned 
on  account  of  some  old  littagation  and  was  nearly  forgotten.  So  he's 
on  the  hunt  for  it  and  we're  going  out  to  hunt  for  it  together.  It 
means  losing  ourselves  in  the  desert  and  the  mountains  for  a  long 
while — there's  no  telling  how  long — but  it  will  be  terribly  romantic 
and  fine  for  my  health  and  when  next  you  hear  from  me  I  may  be 
so  rich  I'll  send  you  a  solid-gold  sewing  machine,  mamma,  and 
papa  a  solid-gold  pulpit. 

There's  no  mail  delivery  where  we're  going  and  no  way  of  reach 
ing  us,  but  don't  worry.  If  anything  happens  I'll  let  you  know. 
If  you  don't  hear  from  me  for  a  long  while  you'll  know  everything's 
all  right.  You  can  send  your  letters  to  me  here  and  I'll  find  them 
when  I  get  back.  Don't  send  me  any  more  money. 

So  good-by  and  blessings  on  your  darling  heads.  John  sends 
his  love. 

Your  loveing,  loveing,  loveing 
MEM. 

As  she  finished  the  letter  she  thought  grimly  of  what  Mr. 
Bodlin  had  said.  She  was  not  quite  sure  just  what  was  going 
to  happen  to  Mr.  Woodville.  In  her  morbid  humor  and  her 
resentment  at  her  own  allotted  torture,  she  had  a  leaning 
toward  the  most  gruesome  fates  for  her  husband — a  death 
from  thirst  or  a  rattlesnake's  fangs  or  a  fall  down  a  precipice. 

One  thing  was  sure,  John  Woodville  was  going  into  the 
desert  to  "stay!" 

She  envied  him  the  calm  certainty  of  his  fate.  The  main 
solace  to  her  pride  in  her  self-obliteration  was  the  thought 
that  she  was  going  to  cease  to  be  a  drain  on  the  flat  purse 
of  her  poor  father.  He  and  her  mother  had  gone  through 
life  like  two  sad  desert  burros,  carrying  burdens.  They 
should  no  longer  carry  hers. 

Villager  though  she  was,  and  used  to  housework,  she  had 
been  brought  up  in  a  certain  pride.  To  be  a  chambermaid  or 
a  waitress  was  a  dismal  come-down,  but  she  must  accept  it. 
What  right  had  she  to  pride? 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  119 

She  would  go  to  Palm  Springs  and  toil  humbly  as  long  as 
she  could,  and  save  her  wages  and  pretend  to  be  a  widow. 
She  would  go  there  in  mourning  and  bury  her  heart  in  sack 
cloth  and  ashes.  And  perhaps  in  that  thief's  crucifixion  to 
which  she  was  carrying  her  own  increasingly  heavy  cross 
she  would  die  unknown  and  be  lost  to  the  too  many  miseries 
of  this  world. 

And  so  she  fared  into  the  desert  to  "stay."  She  went 
there  to  find  obscurity  and  concealment,  to  embrace  poverty 
and  humility. 

But  everything  went  by  contraries,  and  from  that  oasis 
she  was  to  be  caught  up  into  a  fiery  chariot,  for  all  the  world 
to  behold  as  it  rolled  her  round  and  round  the  globe  on  an 
amazing  destiny. 

Everything  that  had  tortured  her  and  was  yet  to  torture 
her  was  a  schooling. 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

THAT  a  lie  never  prospers  is  a  lie  that  always  prospers. 
It  is  discouraging  for  lovers  of  the  truth  to  review  the 
innumerable  and  eternal  untruths  that  are  told  for  the 
truth's  sake. 

Mem  broke  away  from  Yuma  with  an  unusual  economy  of 
falsehood.  Her  trunk  was  the  only  difficulty.  It  had 
followed  her  from  Tucson  to  her  boarding  house  in  Yuma. 
but  she  could  not  check  it  further  without  giving  her  des 
tination. 

After  a  vast  amount  of  thought  Mem  decided  to  ask  her 
landlady  to  hold  her  trunk  for  her  until  she  returned  for  it. 
She  put  into  it  everything  that  she  could  spare.  She  was 
going  to  travel  light  and  forage  on  the  country.  There  was 
an  old  shed  in  the  back  yard,  and  the  dry  air  would  serve  as 
a  perfect  preservative  for  her  belongings  in  case  she  ever 
came  back  for  them.  She  told  the  landlady  the  same  story 
she  embodied  in  her  farewell  letter  home,  and  asked  her  to 
hold  any  mail  that  might  come.  Then  she  slipped  away 
while  Mrs.  Sloat  was  not  looking. 

She  went  to  the  station  with  her  old  suitcase  and  took  the 
train  into  the  Imperial  Valley.  To  her  it  was  as  pathless 
and  mapless  and  as  filled  with  strange  beasts  as  to  the  first 
prospectors.  Only,  she  was  not  looking  for  gold  or  adven 
ture.  She  was  looking  for  peace.  And,  like  the  usual  pio 
neer,  she  was  sure  to  find  almost  everything  but  what  she 
hunted. 

In  her  ignorance  Mem  bought  her  ticket  to  Palm  Springs 
station,  instead  of  to  Whitewater,  where  an  auto  bus  would 
have  met  her. 

She  was  a  little  more  accustomed  now  to  the  desert,  but 
she  took  no  interest  in  the  miracles  that  had  tamed  the 
wastes  of  sand  and  the  Salton  Sea  and  put  the  idle,  sterile 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  121 

welter  to  work  upon  a  vast  garden;  had  built  enormous 
dams  to  impound  the  stray  water,  and  endless  channels  to 
carry  it  where  it  was  needed  when  it  was  needed. 

Mem  was  deposited  at  the  lonely  station,  and  fear  smoth 
ered  her  as  she  watched  the  train  vanish  into  the  glare.  But 
a  rancher,  almost  as  shy  as  she,  offered  her  the  hospitality 
of  his  wagon.  He  was  rough,  unshaven,  and  unkempt,  the 
very  picture  of  a  stage  robber.  Still,  she  preferred  him  to 
the  solitude,  and  he  turned  out  to  be  almost  as  silent. 

He  was  too  timid  to  ask  her  questions  and  she  was  grateful 
to  him  for  that.  He  said  that  he  was  going  past  the  Ran 
dies 's  ranch  anyhow,  and  would  leave  her  there.  And  he 
said  nothing  more. 

When  the  ranchman  had  helped  her  into  his  wagon  he 
unhitched  the  horses  and  made  a  dash  for  the  seat.  The 
horses  began  the  journey  with  a  take-off  from  the  ground 
that  hinted  at  a  voyage  through  the  air  rather  than  along 
the  road.  Then  they  settled  down  to  their  ordinary  gait. 
Mem  would  have  called  it  a  runaway,  but  the  driver  did  not 
even  haul  in  on  the  lines. 

After  a  time,  Mem  saw  ahead  of  her  a  shimmering  lake  and 
trees  and  a  waterfall. 

"That's  Palm  Springs,  I  suppose,"  she  said. 

"No  ma'am,  that's  a  miradge — a  'maginary  miradge. 
They's  nothin'  there  at  tall — no  ma'am." 

And  now  Mem  had  learned  that  her  own  eyes  could  lie  to 
her  with  convincing  vividness.  She  wondered  if  they 
deceived  her  when  they  showed  her  sagebrush  and  crippled 
trees  bent  in  rheumatic  agonies.  She  thought  she  saw  Lilli 
putian  alligators  scuttering  here  and  there.  They  were 
chuckwallas,  but  she  did  not  dare  ask  about  them. 

Suddenly,  as  the  road  led  them  within  eyeshot  of  two  vast 
hills  of  sand  unspotted  with  vegetation,  she  saw  what  she 
was  sure  was  pure  mirage — a  scene  that  must  have  come 
from  her  memory  of  a  picture  in  an  old  volume  of  Bible 
stories.  She  would  almost  have  sworn  that  she  looked  into 
the  desert  of  Araby,  for  she  seemed  to  see  a  train  of  camels 
in  trappings,  and,  perched  upon  their  billowy  humps,  men 

in  the  garb  of  Bedouins. 
y 


122  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

She  rubbed  her  eyes  and  scolded  them,  but  they  persisted 
in  their  story.  Having  been  so  perfectly  deceived  by  the 
equally  visible  lake  and  cascade  that  were  not,  she  did  not 
mention  the  camels  to  her  host,  who  gave  no  sign  of  wonder. 

Then  the  horses  seemed  to  suffer  from  the  same  delusion, 
for  they  grew  panicky  and  began  to  buck  and  back  and  leave 
the  road.  The  driver  yelled  at  them  and  tried  to  force 
them  ahead,  but  as  they  drew  near  the  camels  they  went 
into  hysterics. 

They  refused  to  obey  yells  or  reins  or  the  whiplash  or 
even  each  other's  impulses.  But  at  length  their  insanities 
coincided;  they  slewed  in  the  same  direction,  carried  the 
wagon  into  the  side  ditch,  and  overturned  it. 

Mem  found  herself  gently  spilled  in  the  soft  sand,  so  little 
injured  that  her  only  thought  was  for  pulling  down  her  skirts. 

She  lay  still,  reclining,  not  in  pain,  but  in  wonderment,  as 
the  wagon  slid  on  its  side,  the  driver  stumbling  along  and 
still  clinging  to  the  lines  as  if  he  tried  to  hold  giant  falcons 
in  leash.  The  caravan  grew  restive,  too,  and  Mem  was 
consumed  with  perplexity  as  she  saw  one  of  the  animals 
forced  to  its  knees  not  far  from  her.  The  sheik,  or  whatever 
he  was,  tumbled  from  the  saddle  and  ran  to  her. 

A  brown  face  looked  out  from  the  hood,  and  from  the  scar 
let  lips  surrounded  by  a  short  beard  came  a  voice  startlingly 
un- Arabic. 

"Miss  Steddon!    Miss  Remember  Steddon!" 

She  was  so  dazed  that  she  could  only  stare  into  the  myste 
rious  face  doubly  dark  against  the  blinding  sun.  The  Arab 
smiled  and  laughed. 

"You  don't  know  me?    Don't  you  recall  Mr.  Woodville?" 

This  frightened  her  and  confused  her  unbearably. 

"Who  are  you?"  she  gasped. 

"As  a  matter  of  fact,  I'm  only  Mr.  Holby,  Tom  Holby — 
a  common  movie  actor  out  on  location.  But  the  last  time 
you  saw  me  you  called  me  Mr.  Woodville." 

"Oh,  did  I?    I  was  thinking  of  my  husband." 

"Your  husband!  You  were  Miss  Steddon  a  week  or  two 
ago." 

"Yes,  but—" 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  123 

"Oh,  I  see!  You  have  taken  the  fatal  step  since  then. 
Is  that  Mr.  Woodville  playing  tag  with  those  dancing  demons 
out  there?" 

"Oh  no!    He's  dead." 

"Dead,  already!  and  you  only  married  a  few  days!  Why, 
what  on  earth — " 

She  dropped  her  head.  She  could  not  face  the  rush  of 
sympathetic  horror  in  those  famous  eyes.  She  could  not 
think  in  the  nailing  sunbeams  pounding  her  aching  head. 

Holby  read  this  as  grief  and  sighed. 

"You  don't  want  to  talk  about  it,  of  course.  Forgive  me. 
But  you  can't  stay  here." 


CHAPTER  XIX 

r"PHEY  say  that  the  Magdalen  was  not  really  a  magdalen — 
1  that  tradition  has  forgotten  the  text  and  mixed  her 
with  a  woman  of  Bethany  just  as  Potiphar's  wife  is  care 
lessly  branded  with  the  deeds  of  another  woman. 

But  Mem,  as  she  cowered  on  the  sand,  felt  as  humble  as 
the  Magdalen  in  the  pictures,  though  the  man  who  looked 
down  upon  her  so  tenderly  had  never  posed  as  a  Galilean 
even  in  the  Miracle  Play  they  give  every  summer  in  the 
canon  at  Hollywood. 

Tom  Holby 's  profession  was  the  opposite  of  a  preacher's. 
He  tried  to  show  how  people  actually  did  behave,  not  how 
they  ought  to.  His  authors  would  not  let  him  be  very  real, 
but  always  forced  a  moral,  and  that  is  the  true  immorality 
of  the  moving  pictures;  not  that  they  present  wickedness 
so  that  innocent  people  may  imitate  it,  but  that  they  present 
life  as  if  it  punished  wickedness  and  rewarded  virtue ;  which 
is  a  pretty  lie,  but  a  lie  none  the  less. 

While  Holby  had  an  instant  suspicion  that  Mem  was  not 
telling  him  the  truth,  he  felt  no  call  to  rebuke  her  or  to  wring 
it  from  her.  He  thought:  "She's  pretty.  She's  in  trouble. 
My  business  is  to  be  as  nice  to  her  as  I  can." 

He  lifted  her  from  the  sand,  brushed  her  off,  and  went  for 
her  suitcase,  which  had  been  dumped  into  the  stunted  stubs 
of  a  cholla  cactus,  that  vegetable  porcupine  whose  frosty 
barbs  were  fiendishly  ingenious  in  creeping  into  his  skin. 
Holby  brought  away  a  few  spines  that  would  cause  him  long 
agony  until  with  a  knife  and  pliers  he  should  gouge  them 
out.  The  darts  of  Cupid  might  have  been  plucked  from  the 
same  bush;  and  Holby  found  the  thoughts  of  this  shy  girl 
like  cactus  spines  embedded  in  his  thoughts  tormentingly. 

As  he  lugged  the  suitcase  back  to  the  road  he  tripped  on 
the  long  skirts  of  his  Arabian  burnous.  He  had  practiced 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  125 

walking  in  it  when  he  was  before  the  camera,  but  he  was 
thinking  of  Mem  now. 

He  was  thinking:  "She  was  not  married  when  I  met  her 
on  the  train;  a  week  later  she  is  a  widow.  She  has  gone 
through  two  earthquakes  in  quick  succession — a  honeymoon 
and  a  funeral.  I  have  found  that,  whenever  a  calamity  occurs 
to  anybody,  lack  of  money  adds  to  the  horror  of  it." 

His  instinct  was  not  to  save  her  soul,  but  to  make  her 
body  comfortable. 

And  so  when  he  set  the  suitcase  down  by  Mem,  he  asked 
her  to  rest  upon  it,  and  stood  between  her  and  the  sun  while 
he  spoke  very  earnestly. 

"Tell  me  to  mind  my  own  business  if  I'm  impertinent, 
but  may  I  ask  you  one  question?  Did  your  husband  leave 
you  any  money?" 

Mem  was  so  startled  that  she  mumbled: 
"A  little." 
"Not  much?" 
"Not  much." 
"Enough?" 
"For  a  while." 

"Have  you  come  here  to  be  with  your  parents  or  friends 
or  relatives?" 

"No.     I'm  looking  for  a  position  as  a  chambermaid." 
"My  God!    You!" 

Her  eyes  were  amazed  at  his  horror.     He  cried,  again: 
"You  with  your  beauty!    Oh  no!" 

She  had  been  brought  up  on  a  motto,  "Praise  to  the  face 
is  open  disgrace."  She  snubbed  him  with  a  fierce  toss  of  the 
head. 

He  laughed  aloud.  He  had  been  a  small-town  youth  and 
had  known  that  motto,  but  he  had  been  so  long  among 
women  who  were  of  a  quite  opposite  mind  that  he  was  amused 
by  the  quaint  backwoods  ideal  of  regarding  charm  as  a 
thing  unmentionable  in  polite  society. 

While  he  was  trying  to  keep  his  face  straight,  as  he  apolo 
gized,  a  sharp  voice  broke  in  upon  them.  A  man  in  a  pith 
helmet,  dark  goggles,  and  a  riding  suit  had  steered  a  restive 
horse  close  to  them  and  was  complaining: 


126  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

"Say,  Holby,  do  you  realize  you're  keeping  the  whole 
company  waiting  in  this  ghastly  heat?" 

"I  beg  your  pardon,  Mr.  Folger.  Just  a  moment,  old 
man.  Let  me  present  you  to  Miss — Mrs.  Woodville." 

The  director  touched  his  helmet  and  nodded  curtly.  As 
he  whirled  his  horse  to  ride  back  to  his  caravan,  Holby  ran 
and,  seizing  his  bridle,  led  the  horse  aside  and  talked  to  Folger 
earnestly. 

"Look  here,  old  man.  That  girl  is  a  friend  of  mine  and 
beautiful  as  a  peach.  She's  got  the  skin  and  the  eyes  that 
photograph  to  beat  the  band.  She's  just  lost  her  husband 
and  come  out  to  this  hell  hole  to  be  a  chambermaid!  It's 
too  outrageous  to  think  of.  Give  her  a  chance,  won't  you?" 

The  director  twisted  in  his  saddle  and  stared  at  Mem  with 
expert  eyes,  then  laughed  at  Holby: 

"Is  she  a  sweetie  of  yours?" 

"None  of  that,  now!  She's  as  nice  as  they  make  'em. 
But  I  can't  stand  the  thought  of  her  working  on  a  ranch, 
making  beds  and  wrestling  slop  jars.  Give  her  a  test  and 
put  her  in  the  mob  scene  or  something.  And  don't  tell 
Robina  I  told  you  to,  in  Heaven's  name." 

Folger  was  puzzled.  Robina  Teele  was  a  trouble  maker 
in  the  company.  But  she  made  profitable  trouble  in  the 
hearts  of  the  public.  Just  now  she  was  smitten  with  Tom 
Holby,  and  she  had  dealt  fiercely  with  one  or  two  minor 
actresses  he  had  been  polite  to. 

But  it  was  bad  studio  politics  to  encourage  these  tyrannies. 
Stars  had  to  be  disciplined  with  care,  like  racehorses,  yet 
curbed  somehow. 

If  Holby  could  be  freed  from  Teele's  domination,  even  by 
the  sharp  knife  of  jealousy,  it  might  be  a  good  thing  for  the 
next  picture. 

Folger  cast  another  look  at  Mem.  There  was  a  fresh 
meekness  about  her,  an  aura  of  gracious  appeal.  It  would 
do  no  harm  to  try  her  out.  If  she  were  a  failure  no  one 
would  know  it.  If  she  were  a  discovery,  he  would  get  the 
credit.  It  would  not  hurt  him  to  do  Holby  a  favor,  for  the 
director's  own  contract  was  under  question  of  renewal  and 
a  good  word  from  Holby  would  not  come  amiss. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  127 

"All  right,"  he  said,  "I'll  take  a  chance.  Two  of  the 
extra  women  keeled  over  this  morning  from  the  heat.  I'll 
have  my  assistant  take  her  to  the  wardrobe  woman  and  get 
her  fitted  out  and  made  up.  She  can  appear  in  the  famine 
scene,  and  I'll  bring  her  forward  for  a  close-up.  If  she  looks 
good  in  the  rushes,  we'll  keep  her  on.  And  now,  for  Heaven's 
sake,  get  back  on  your  camel,  for  the  camera  men  are  just 
about  ready  to  drop." 

He  set  spurs  to  his  horse  and  rode  across  the  field,  with 
his  megaphone  to  his  lips  as  he  bellowed  his  orders. 

The  caravan  resumed  its  plodding  advance,  and  Holby 
turned  back  to  say  to  Remember: 

"I've  taken  a  great  liberty.  I  can't  bear  the  thought  of 
your  working  as  a  servant  when  there  may  be  a  big  career 
before  you  in  the  pictures.  The  director  saw  you  and  he 
wants  you  to — to  help  him  out.  There  is  a  shortage  in  the 
company  for  the  big  scene,  and  you'd  be  a  godsend.  Try  it 
and  see  if  you  like  it.  If  you  don't,  there's  no  harm  done 
and  you'll  be  paid  well  for  your  trouble.  If  you  do  like  it, 
why—  But  to  please  me — I  mean  the  director — do  this, 
won't  you?" 

He  knew  people  well  enough  to  glean  from  the  first  glance 
into  her  eyes  that  Mem  was  appalled  at  the  prospect  of 
playing  in  the  movies,  and  that  his  one  hope  was  to  put  his 
gift  in  the  form  of  a  petition. 

Before  she  could  quite  realize  what  she  was  doing,  Mem 
had  said: 

"Well,  of  course,  if  it  would  be  doing  you  a  favor — " 

"An  immense  favor." 

"I  don't  know  anything,  you  know." 

"That's  all  the  better.  You  have  nothing  to  unlearn. 
Here's  Mr.  Ellis,  the  assistant  director.  He'll  take  care  of 
you.  I've  got  to  go." 

He  introduced  a  young  man  who  rode  up  and  dismounted 
with  all  the  meekness  of  the  meekest  office  on  earth,  that 
of  assistant  director.  In  a  tone  of  more  than  vice-presiden 
tial  humility  Ellis  explained  to  Mem  what  she  was  to  do. 

She  was  aghast  at  this  sudden  plunge  into  the  deep  waters 
of  an  unknown  sea.  She  turned  to  tell  Tom  Holby  that  she 


128  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

really  could  not  accept.  But  he  was  in  no  position  to  hear 
her.  He  was  in  every  position.  As  his  camel  rose  to  its 
knees,  Holby  was  flopped  about  in  the  air  with  a  violence 
that  threatened  to  throw  his  head  afar  like  a  stone  in  a  sling. 
When  the  camel  had  established  itself  on  its  four  sofa- 
cushioned  feet  it  moved  off  with  an  undulating  motion  as 
sickening  as  an  English  Channel  steamer's. 

Mem  turned  to  appeal  to  the  man  who  had  promised  to 
drive  her  to  the  Randies  ranch.  But  he  was  standing  far 
out  in  a  sea  of  sage  and  cactus,  dolefully  regarding  his 
wagon,  which  lay  on  its  back  with  three  and  a  half  wheels 
spinning  in  air  and  the  other  half  of  one  scattered  about> 
the  desert. 

While  Mem  floundered  in  the  sands  of  her  own  uncertain 
ties  many  camels  went  by,  and  horses  in  gorgeous  trappings. 
Then  followed  a  string  of  light  automobiles  loaded  with 
machinery  that  she  did  not  understand,  with  lighting  equip 
ment,  with  airplane  propellers  to  kick  up  a  sandstorm,  and 
with  paraphernalia  of  every  sort. 

After  these  walked  and  rode  a  great  crowd  of  men  and 
women  in  Arabian  costumes,  their  faces  and  hands  painted 
in  raw  colors.  Ellis  checked  one  of  the  cars  in  which  sat 
a  woman,  Mrs.  Kittery,  to  whom  he  introduced  Mrs.  Wood- 
ville,  explaining  what  was  to  be  done  with  her. 

"Get  in  here,  my  dear,"  said  Mrs.  Kittery. 

And  before  Mem  could  protest  Mr.  Ellis  had  flung  her 
suitcase  in,  helped  her  to  a  seat,  slammed  the  tin  door  on 
her,  swung  into  his  saddle  and  away. 

The  car  kept  to  what  road  there  was,  and  Mrs.  Kittery 
soon  learned  how  abysmal  Mem's  innocence  was.  But 
she  was  used  to  the  ignorance  of  extra  women  and  she  was 
glad  that  Mem  was  not  a  Chinese,  a  Turk,  or  an  Indian. 
She  could  at  least  understand  English. 

After  a  long  and  furiously  jolty  passage  over  the  sand  the 
caravan  of  motors  and  the  mob  of  suffering  extras  came  to 
a  halt  on  the  shady  side  of  a  cluster  of  Arabian  tents. 

Mrs.  Kittery  asked  one  of  the  extra  women  to  make  up 
Mrs.  Woodville  while  she  found  a  costume  in  the  hamper. 
This  amiable  person  was  still  unknown  to  fame  as  Leva 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  129 

Lemaire,  really  Mrs.  David  Wilkinson,  whose  husband  had 
been  killed  in  the  war,  leaving  her  with  three  children  whom 
she  supported  by  this  form  of  toil.  She  preferred  it  to  her 
previous  experiences  as  a  school-teacher  and  a  trained 
nurse.  She  made  from  forty  to  fifty  dollars  a  week,  and 
sometimes  more,  and  she  led  a  life  of  picturesque  travel 
from  nationality  to  nationality — a  Mexican  one  week,  a 
Hindu  another,  a  farm  wife  again,  a  squaw,  or  a  harem 
odalisque.  Mem  felt  that  the  extra  woman's  life  had  its 
fascinations. 

The  art  was  "the  business"  to  Mrs.  Wilkinson,  and  she 
called  it  that.  She  was  generous  with  grease  paint  and 
information,  and  she  had  a  village  mind  that  translated  to 
Mem's  village  mind  these  foreign  customs  in  a  language 
she  could  understand. 

Only  such  a  steady-souled  person  could  have  kept  Mem 
from  bolting  in  panic  before  the  ordeal  of  having  her  face 
calcimined  and  tinted,  her  eyelids  painted,  the  lashes  leaded, 
her  eyebrows  penciled,  her  lips  encarnadined,  and  red  dots 
put  here  and  there  to  give  depth.  To  her  the  decoration  of 
the  face  with  any  color  from  outside  had  been  hitherto  an 
advertisement  of  eager  vice.  And  now  she  was  a  painted 
woman,  too! 

Mrs.  Wilkinson's  own  face  was  decorated  like  an  Indian 
warrior's,  including  certain  blotches  of  carmine,  which  she 
explained : 

"My  nose  is  too  broad  and  flat,  so  I  paint  the  sides  of  it 
red  and  that  photographs  like  a  shadow;  and  I  have  a 
double  chin  which  disappears  in  the  picture,  thanks  to  the 
red;  and  I  narrow  my  fat  cheeks  the  same  way.  But  you 
don't  need  any  of  that  modeling.  You're  perfect." 

Mem  was  dazed  by  this  constant  reference  to  her  beauty. 
At  home  it  had  been  a  guiding  principle  that  praising  chil 
dren  made  them  conceited.  These  first  compliments  came 
like  slaps  in  the  face.  But  she  was  beginning  to  find  them 
stimulating. 

By  the  time  Mem  was  varnished  Mrs.  Kittery  had  arrived 
with  gaudy  costumes,  earrings,  necklaces,  and  bracelets. 
Mem  was  soon  so  disguised  that  when  Leva  Lemaire  offered 


130  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

her  a  peek  in  the  mirrored  top  of  her  make-up  box  she  could 
not  recognize  herself  at  all.  She  looked  like  a  cheap  chromo 
of  somebody  else. 

''There's  two  things  you'll  learn  about  the  business,  if 
you  stay  in  it,"  said  Leva;  "you've  got  to  get  up  at  an 
ungodly  hour  and  break  your  neck  making  ready  on  time. 
And  then  you've  got  to  sit  around  for  hours  and  hours  with 
nothing  to  do.  Half  the  time  they  don't  reach  you  all  day. 
And  most  of  the  scenes  you're  taken  in  are  cut  out  of  the 
final  picture.  Otherwise  it's  a  nice  life." 

And  now  that  her  pores  were  stuffed  with  paint  which  it 
was  disastrous  to  mop  with  a  handkerchief,  Mem  had  the 
task  of  waiting  while  the  hot  wind  brought  the  great  drops 
of  sweat  to  her  skin  and  the  blown  sand  kept  up  an  incessant 
scratching. 

In  the  distance,  in  the  relentless  flagellation  of  the  sun, 
the  principals  of  the  company  enacted  before  a  group  of 
cameras  a  drama  that  Mem  could  not  understand.  The 
camels  defiled  slowly,  then  galloped  back  and  defiled  slowly 
again  and  again.  There  were  long  arguments;  the  director 
and  his  assistant  dashed  back  and  forth,  trumpeting  through 
their  megaphones. 

The  camels  alone  revealed  artistic  temperament.  They 
began  to  fight  one  another.  A  group  of  two  dragged  their 
terrified  passengers  hither  and  yon  and  knocked  over  a 
camera.  One  of  them  fled  and,  dumping  his  belfryman,  got 
clean  away.  He  was  not  found  until  the  next  day,  and  then 
in  Palm  Canon,  where  he  reveled  in  a  perfect  duplicate  of 
a  homeland  oasis. 

Leva  explained  to  Mem  what  all  the  pother  was  about: 

"You  see,  they  take  everything  first  at  a  distance — long 
shots,  they  call  them.  They  have  three  cameras  here,  but 
something  always  goes  wrong,  or  looks  as  if  it  could  be 
improved;  so  they  make  a  lot  of  takes.  Then  they  come 
closer  and  take  medium  shots  to  cut  into  the  long  shots. 
Then  they  take  close-ups  of  the  most  dramatic  moments. 
All  these  have  to  match — though  they  usually  don't — so 
that  they  can  be  assembled  in  the  studio  for  the  finished 
picture. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  131 

"The  camels  go  by  one  way  to  show  they're  passing  a 
certain  spot.  Then  they  go  by  the  same  spot  in  the  opposite 
direction  to  show  the  return.  But  in  the  finished  picture 
that  won't  take  place  till  a  week  later.  But  they  take  the 
things  that  happen  on  the  same  spot  at  the  same  time,  no 
matter  where  they  occur  in  the  picture.  It  keeps  the  actors 
awfully  mussed  up  in  their  minds.  They  don't  know  whether 
they're  playing  to-day,  last  month,  or  two  years  from  now. 
That's  Robina  Teele  on  that  biggest  camel.  She's  earning 
her  money  to-day  by  the  sweat  of  her  whole  system.  She's 
sweet  on  Tom  Holby  and  as  jealous  of  him  as  a  fiend.  She's 
an  awful  cat,  but  he's  a  mighty  nice  boy — not  spoiled  a  bit 
by  being  advertised  as  the  most  beautiful  thing  in  the  world. 
I  was  in  a  scene  with  him  once;  he  was  just  as  considerate 
as  if  I  had  been  Norma  Talmadge  or  Pauline  Frederick." 

While  the  extras  waited  and  simmered  their  luncheon 
was  served.  The  property  crew  went  about  among  them, 
dealing  out  pasteboard  boxes  containing  sandwiches  wrapped 
in  oiled  papers,  a  bit  of  fried  chicken,  hard-boiled  eggs,  a 
piece  of  cake,  and  a  Californian  fruit — a  peach,  a  pear,  grapes, 
figs,  a  banana,  or  an  orange. 

There  was  a  caldron  of  coffee  for  those  that  wanted  it  hot, 
iced  tea,  and  bottles  of  pop. 

Mem  had  never  been  on  a  better-fed  picnic.  The  women 
and  men  squatted  on  the  ground  and  ate,  swapping  fruit 
and  repartee.  Some  of  the  jokes  sent  blushes  flying  beneath 
the  layers  of  paint  on  Mem's  skin.  There  was  a  vast  amount 
of  caustic  fun  made  of  the  principals,  the  director,  and  the 
management.  But  Mem  tried  to  remind  herself  that  the 
sewing  circles  at  home  were  just  as  busy  tearing  down  the 
reputations  of  the  neighbors,  only  with  a  holier-than-thou 
contempt  entirely  lacking  here. 

There  was  a  gypsy  spirit  in  this  company  that  Mem  had 
never  met.  The  gayety  was  irresistible,  and  she  managed  to 
control  her  horror  when  she  found  that  she  was  almost  the 
only  woman  who  refused  a  cigarette.  Even  Mrs.  Wilkinson 
dug  up  a  package  from  her  desert  robes. 

The  principals  had  their  refreshments  taken  to  them,  and 
snatched  it  between  scenes.  Robina  did  not  eat  at  all.  She 


132  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

lived  in  an  eternal  Lent,  since  she  had  to  fight  a  sneaking 
tendency  to  plumpness.  She  suffered  anguishes  of  fasting 
and  privation  like  a  religious  zealot,  but  from  the  opposite 
reason:  the  zealots  crucified  the  flesh  because  it  was  the 
devil's  lure;  she  in  order  to  give  it  allurement  and  keep 
time's  claws  off  her  as  long  as  possible. 

So  now,  in  a  heat  that  drove  the  desert  Indians  into  the 
shade  and  idleness,  these  dainty  actresses  and  actors  invited 
sunstroke  and  labored  with  muscles  and  emotions  at  full 
blast  in  order  to  make  pictures  and  minimize  the  appalling 
overhead  expense  of  every  wasted  hour. 

After  a  time  the  extras  were  called  forth  from  the  com 
parative  shelter  of  the  tents  to  the  scene  of  action.  It  was 
like  being  tossed  from  the  red-hot  stove  lid  into  the  very 
fire. 

To  Mem  it  was  all  incredible  phantasmagory.  She  could 
not  believe  that  this  was  she  who  stumbled  across  the  sand, 
twitching  her  skirts  out  of  the  talons  of  the  cactuses,  care 
fully  dabbing  the  sweat  from  her  face  with  a  handkerchief 
already  colored  like  a  painter's  brush  rag,  and  jingling,  as 
she  walked,  with  barbaric  jewelry. 

The  mob  went  forward  slowly  and  she  recognized  Tom 
Holby  on  a  camel.  She  hoped  that  he  would  not  recognize 
her,  but  he  studied  all  the  faces  and,  being  used  to  disguises, 
made  her  out  and  hailed  her  with  the  password: 

"How  you  standing  it?" 

She  called  up  to  him: 

"All  right,  thank  you." 

There  was  vast  interest  in  her  from  now  on.  The  leading 
man  had  singled  out  an  extra  woman  for  special  attention, 
and  the  gossip  went  round  with  a  rush  as  of  wings. 

Mem  did  not  know  that  she  was  already  a  public  property. 
She  would  have  fled  as  from  a  plague  if  she  had  known. 
Later  she  would  come  to  realize  that  these  people  loved  to 
believe  the  worst,  forgive  it,  and  absolve  it  with  a  for 
bearance  met  hardly  anywhere  else  except  in  heaven. 

The  director  massed  the  extras  together  and  addressed 
them  from  his  horse: 

"Ladies  and  gentlemen,  you  are  supposed  to  be  an  Arabian 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  133 

tribe  driven  from  your  homes  by  the  cruel  enemy.  You 
are  wandering  across  the  desert  without  food  or  water, 
dying  of  hunger  and  thirst.  Later  in  the  afternoon,  if  we 
can  reach  it,  you  will  be  overtaken  by  a  sandstorm  and  many 
of  you  will  perish  miserably.  It's  hard  work,  I  know,  but  if 
you  will  go  to  it  we'll  be  out  of  this  hell  hole  to-morrow  and 
there  will  be  more  comfortable  work  in  the  cool  night 
shots.  So  make  it  snappy,  folks,  and  do  what  you  are  told 
on  cue,  with  all  the  pep  you  can  put  into  it.  I  thank  you!" 

The  company  was  then  divided  into  groups,  with  business 
assigned  to  each.  Long  shots  were  taken  again  and  again. 
Small  groups  were  posed  with  as  much  care  as  if  the  sun  were 
benign  instead  of  diabolic. 

Close-ups  of  individuals  were  taken,  the  most  striking 
types  being  selected  and  coached  to  express  crises  of  feeling: 
"  You  go  mad  and  babble,  old  man,  will  you?  Tear  at  your 
throat  and  let  your  tongue  hang  out?  .  .  .  You,  miss,  will  you 
fall  back  in  your  mother's  arms — you  be  mother,  will  you, 
miss,  and  catch  her — you  are  to  die,  you  know;  just  roll  your 
eyes  back  and  sigh  and  sink  into  a  heap.  And  you,  mother, 
wring  your  hands  and  beat  your  breast  and  wail.  You  under 
stand — Oriental  stuff,  eh?  ...  And  I'd  like  somebody  just  to 
look  up  to  heaven  and  pray  for  mercy — somebody  with  big 
eyes.  Let  me  see — no,  you're —  I'm  saving  you  for  the — 
You,  the  young  lady  over  there — will  you  step  out  ?  Please ! 
Come  on,  come  on!  I  won't  bite  unless  I'm  kept  waiting; 
it's  warm  you  know,  folks.  Come  out,  please.  Oh,  it's  Mrs. 
Woodbridge,  isn't  it?  I  met  you  this  morning.  Here's 
your  chance.  Do  this  for  me,  like  a  good  girl,  and  give  your 
self  to  it.  Look  up  to  heaven;  if  the  sun  brings  tears  to 
your  eyes,  all  right,  but  let  them  come  from  your  soul,  dear, 
if  you  can.  You  see,  you  have  seen  your  people  dying  like 
flies  about  you,  from  famine  and  hardship.  You  look  up 
and  say,  '  O  God,  you  don't  mean  for  us  to  die  in  this  useless 
torture,  do  you,  dear  God?  Take  my  life  and  let  these 
others  live.  Won't  you,  dear  God?' 

"Something  like  that,  you  know.  Don't  look  up  yet. 
You'll  blind  yourself.  Wait  till  I  get  the  camera  set.  Here, 
boys,  make  a  very  close  close-up  of  this." 


i34  SOULS    FOR   SALE 

Mem  stood  throbbing  from  head  to  foot  with  embarrass 
ment  and  with  a  strange  inrush  of  alien  moods.  The  fierce 
eyes  of  the  director  burning  through  his  dark  glasses,  the 
curious  instigation  in  his  voice,  the  plea  to  do  well  for  him, 
quickened  her  magically. 

The  camera  men  set  up  their  tripods  before  her,  the  lenses, 
like  threatening  muzzles,  aimed  point-blank ;  then  they  bent 
and  squinted  through  their  finders,  and  brought  tapes  up 
and  held  them  so  close  that  their  hot  hands  touched  her  when 
they  measured  her  exact  distance,  then  adjusted  the  focuses. 
One  of  them  lifted  the  fold  of  her  hood  a  little  aside  from 
her  brow.  The  director  stared  at  her  keenly,  then  put  out 
his  hand  and  asked  for  a  powder  puff.  He  dusted  her  face 
gently  to  dull  the  glistening  surface. 

They  treated  her  as  if  she  were  an  automaton,  and  she 
became  one,  a  mere  channel  for  an  emotion  to  gush  through. 

Folger  took  her  by  the  arm  and  murmured : 

"  Just  once,  now,  dear,  before  we  make  the  take.  Remem 
ber  what  I  told  you.  Let  your  heart  break.  Give  us  all 
you've  got.  Look  round  first  and  see  your  dying  people. 
That's  your  father  over  there  just  gasping  his  life  out.  Your 
mother  lies  dead  back  there;  you've  covered  her  poor  little 
body  with  sand  to  keep  the  jackals  from  it.  Your  own  heart 
is  broken  in  a  thousand  pieces.  Can  you  do  it?  Will  you? 
That's  right.  Look  round  now  and  let  yourself  go." 

She  felt  herself  bewitched,  benumbed,  yet  mystically 
alive  to  a  thousand  tragedies.  Her  eyes  rolled  around  the 
staring  throng.  Some  of  them  were  helping  her  by  looking 
their  agony;  others  were  out  of  the  mood,  adjusting  their 
robes,  freshening  their  make-up,  or  whispering  and  smiling. 
But  the  gift  of  belief,  the  genius  of  substitution,  fell  upon  her 
like  a  flame,  and  nothing  mattered.  They  had  brought 
music  out  into  this  inferno — a  wheezy  organ,  a  cello,  and  a 
violin — that  cried  like  the  "  linnet  that  had  lost  her  way 
and  sang  on  a  blackened  bough  in  hell." 

Her  heavy  eyes  made  out  Tom  Holby  gazing  down  at 
her  from  his  camel  and  pouring  sympathy  from  his  own  soul 
into  hers.  Then  she  flung  her  head  from  side  to  side  in  a 
torment  of  woe,  cast  her  head  back,  and  heaved  her  bi^ 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  135 

eyes  up  into  the  cruel  brazier  of  the  skies,  seemed  to  see  God 
peering  down  upon  the  little  multitude,  and  moved  her 
lips  in  supplication.  She  felt  the  words  and  the  anguish 
wringing  her  throat,  and  the  tears  came  trooping  from  her 
eyes,  ran  shining  into  her  mouth,  and  she  swallowed  them 
and  found  them  bitter-sweet  with  an  exaltation  of  agony. 

She  did  not  know  that  the  director  had  whispered, 
"Camera!"  and  was  watching  her  like  a  tiger,  striving  to 
drive  his  own  energy  into  her.  She  did  not  hear  the  camera 
men  turning  their  cranks.  There  was  such  weird  reality  in 
her  grief  that  the  director's  glasses  were  blurred  with  his 
own  tears;  the  camera  men  were  gulping  hard. 

She  did  happen  to  note,  as  her  upward  stare  encountered 
Tom  Holby's  eyes  on  high,  that  tears  were  dripping  from  his 
lashes  and  that  his  mouth  was  quivering. 

The  sight  of  his  tears  sent  through  her  a  strange  pang  of 
triumphant  sympathy,  and  she  broke  down  sobbing,  would 
have  fallen  to  the  sand,  if  Leva  Lemaire  had  not  caught 
her  and  drawn  her  into  her  arms,  kissing  her  and  whispering: 

' '  Wonderful !    Wonderful ! ' ' 

She  felt  a  hand  on  her  arm  and  was  drawn  from  Leva's 
arms  into  a  man's.  Her  shoulders  were  squeezed  hard  by 
big  hands  and  she  heard  a  voice  that  identified  her  captor 
as  the  director.  He  was  saying: 

"God  bless  you!  That  was  the  real  stuff!  We  won't 
make  you  do  it  over.  We  had  two  cameras  on  you.  You're 
all  right!  You're  a  good  girl!  The  real  thing!" 

Then  she  began  to  laugh  and  choke,  became  an  utter  fool. 

This  was  her  first  experience  of  the  passion  of  mimicry. 
She  was  as  shamed  as  glorified,  as  drained  yet  as  exultant, 
as  if  a  god  had  seized  her  and  embraced  her  fiercely  for  a 
moment,  then  left  her  aching,  an  ember  in  the  ashes. 

The  director  was  already  calling  the  mob  to  the  next  task. 
She  could  not  help  glancing  toward  Tom  Holby.  His  camel 
was  moving  off  with  the  crowd,  but  he  was  turning  back  to 
gaze  at  her.  He  was  nodding  his  head  in  approval  and  he 
raised  his  hand  in  a  salute  of  profound  respect. 


CHAPTER  XX 

'""pHAT  afternoon  the  sandstorm  was  to  be  "pulled  off." 
1  Dynamos  mounted  on  trucks  carrying  airplane  pro 
pellers  were  gathered  toward  the  two  great  dunes  piled  to 
the  northeast  of  Palm  Springs,  hiding  who  knows  what? 
under  the  sands  heaped  by  winds  that  have  roared  down 
San  Gorgonio  Pass  for  asons. 

Toward  the  greater  of  them,  a  mass  whose  color  had  now 
the  chatoyant  luster  of  an  opal  five  hundred  feet  high, 
a  hillock  whereon  no  more  vegetation  grows  than  on  an  opal, 
and  whereon  the  light  plays  milkily  through  all  the  gamut 
of  tinges,  the  caravan  moved.  The  desert  was  to  represent 
Sahara  in  the  picture,  and  these  actors  and  actresses  were  to 
convince  the  throngs  that  they  wrere  really  a  tribe  of  misery 
on  whom  fate  heaped  a  cyclone  of  sand  to  crown  their  martyr 
doms  of  hunger,  thirst,  and  weariness. 

As  the  straggling  hirelings  of  art  trudged  across  the  shifty 
floor  of  sand,  panting  between  the  heat  that  beat  down  from 
the  sky  and  shot  up  from  the  glassy  meadow,  the  air  stood 
still  and  they  cooked  as  in  a  fire  box.  Their  feet  fried  and 
their  hearts  staggered. 

The  suffocation  sent  a  few  of  the  crusaders  to  the  ground, 
gasping  like  fish  in  a  creel.  These  were  gathered  up  and 
carried  half  dead  to  the  shade,  where  a  physician  restored 
them.  They  were  humiliated  and  grieved  at  the  treachery 
of  their  own  faculties. 

The  others  hardly  so  much  marched  as  tumbled  forward. 
Mem  was  aided  somehow  by  the  ardor  of  her  little  success. 
She  felt  that  if  she  could  only  keep  to  the  fore  she  might  be 
offered  another  draught  of  the  new  wine  of  art. 

By  and  by  she  overtook  Tom  Holby,  who  checked  his 
camel  to  have  a  word  with  her: 

"I'd  ask  you  to  take  my  place  up  here,  but  I'm  afraid 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  137 

you'd  be  as  seasick  as  I  was  the  first  time  I  rode  one  of  these 
wallowers.  But  hang  on  to  that  strap  and  it  will  help  you 
a  little." 

Mem  seized  a  pendent  strap  and  was  haled  along. 
She  did  not  know,  and  Tom  Holby  did  not  care,  how  much 
this  interested  the  neglected  multitude. 

After  a  time,  as  they  slackened  their  pace  to  mount  the 
dune  in  whose  soft  surface  her  feet  sank  above  the  ankles, 
Mem  noted  that  the  smothering  hush  of  the  air  was  quick 
ened  with  little  agues  of  wind.  Gimlets  of  sand  rose  and 
twisted,  ran  and  fell.  A  fiendish  malice  seemed  to  inspire 
them  and  they  were  vicious  as  devils  at  play. 

Then  the  sky  ahead  was  blotted  from  sight  by  a  vast  yel 
low  blanket.  It  came  forward  as  if  giants  were  carrying  it 
to  spread  over  the  terrified  pilgrims.  Ahead  of  it  darted 
and  swirled  spinning  dervishes  of  sand. 

The  blanket,  as  it  approached,  became  a  wall  hurry 
ing,  a  vast  dam  driven  by  mountain  floods  in  the  rear. 
The  crest  of  it  was  a  spume  of  sand.  The  menace  of  it  was 
as  of  a  Day  of  Judgment. 

The  actors  had  never  seen  anything  of  its  sort,  but  they 
could  guess  what  the  camels  knew — that  it  was  of  dreadful 
omen. 

A  few  years  before,  a  herd  of  cattle  rolling  up  from  Yuma 
had  been  caught  in  such  a  sandstorm,  and  when  it  passed 
they  were  all  dead  and  buried. 

The  camels  began  to  betray  the  terror  that  the  people 
surmised.  They  grew  frantic  with  panic,  but  knew  that 
flight  was  vain.  They  were  at  the  mercy  of  whatever  god  it 
is  that  beasts  adore.  Tom  Holby's  mount,  without  waiting 
for  command,  dropped  to  its  belly  and  stretched  out  its 
neck  and  closed  its  eyes  against  the  peril. 

But  the  camera  men  set  their  tripods  and  began  to  turn 
their  cranks.  They  had  the  instinct  of  the  trade  and  were 
hopeful  that  if  they  themselves  did  not  live  their  pictures 
might. 

Tom  Holby  dropped  from  his  post  and  gathered  Mem 
into  the  shelter  of  the  earners  bulk.  She  did  not  know  or 
care  that  his  arm  was  about  her  as  they  stood  peering 

10 


138  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

across  the  parapet  of  the  camel's  back  at  the  onset  of  the 
advancing  Niagara.  Other  women  crowded  to  the  same 
camel.  The  rest  of  the  crowd  flung  themselves  down  and 
dug  their  arms  to  the  elbows  in  the  sand  lest  they  be  swept 
away. 

A  courier  gale  leaped  upon  them  in  a  yelling  charge, 
with  whips  of  fire  that  flung  the  tripods  over,  and  the  camera 
men  with  them.  But  still  they  persisted,  and,  shielding 
their  lenses  with  their  own  bodies,  turned  them  this  way 
and  that,  grinding  the  cranks  and  picking  up  what  groups 
they  saw  about  them. 

The  torrid  blast  dashed  the  sand  in  shovelfuls  upon  the 
groveling  crowd.  The  great  robes  fluttered,  flapped,  bellied, 
and,  ripping  loose,  went  whooping. 

The  gliding  precipice  of  sand  arrived  and  hid  the  sun  in  a 
gruesome  saffron  fog.  And  then  precipice  was  avalanche. 
With  abrupt  chill,  a  brown  cold  mountain  fell  on  them, 
stopped  the  breath,  and  played  shrapnel  on  the  skin  in  a 
maelstrom  of  dagger  points  that  stabbed  from  every  side. 

Tom  Holby  wrapped  his  burnous  about  Mem  as  they 
cowered  in  the  lee  of  his  camel.  The  sand  broke  over  their 
bulwark  as  breakers  leap  across  a  rock.  They  were  drowned 
in  waves  that  did  not  recede.  The  sand  found  them  inside 
their  robes;  it  filled  their  nostrils,  their  mouths  when  they 
gulped  for  breath.  The  breakers  of  sand  swept  round  upon 
them,  broke  back  over  them,  and  with  a  grinding  uproar 
that  threatened  to  split  the  ears  they  packed  with  sand. 

Tom  Holby  kept  struggling  to  fling  off  the  hillock  that 
formed  about  them,  kept  lifting  Mem's  head  above  the 
mound  that  grew.  Sagebrushes  ripped  from  their  places 
shot  by,  tearing  the  skin  they  touched.  Roots  of  old  mes- 
quite  went  over  like  clubs,  prickly  pears  and  masses  of 
cactus  hurtled  past  in  the  torrent. 

Suddenly  the  sand  tide  was  gone.  But  a  sea  of  rain 
followed  it,  cruelly  cold  and  ruthless.  It  turned  the  mounds 
into  gobs  of  wet  sand,  slimy  and  odious.  What  had  been 
a  world  of  drought  in  frenzy  became  a  lake  in  a  squall. 
What  garments  the  wind  had  not  wrenched  free  grew  sloppy 
and  icy  and  loathsomely  sticky. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  139 

For  half  an  hour  the  deluge  harried  the  dismal  caravan. 

Then  in  an  instant  the  rain  was  over.  The  hurricane  of 
sand  pursued  by  flood  passed  on  up  the  valley,  to  rend  the 
orange  groves  and  tear  the  fishing  boats  from  their  moorings. 

The  sun  resumed  his  own  tyranny  and  lashed  the  thrice- 
wretched  army  back  to  its  camp. 

But  the  camera  men  retrieved  their  instruments  from  the 
rubber  covers  they  had  wrapped  about  them  with  a  mother 
ing  devotion,  and  the  director  checked  the  retreat  and 
formed  it  in  groups  for  record. 

The  airplane  propellers  that  haa  come  forth  to  imitate 
the  frenzy  of  the  storm  had  yielded  to  it  and  were  torn  from 
their  axles,  lost  here  and  there  beneath  the  new  surface  of 
the  blinking  opal. 


CHAPTER  XXI 

THE  footsore  and  saddlesore  moving-picture  people  fell 
back  upon  Palm  Springs  like  a  defeated  army. 

The  village,  a  cool  shadow  on  a  bleak  waste,  had  known 
nothing  of  the  storm  except  as  a  distant  spectacle.  The 
skirts  of  the  gale  had  set  the  palm  leaves  to  rattling  together 
as  in  ancient  staff  play,  and  the  limber  towers  of  the  tallest 
trees  swayed  and  shuddered,  but  not  one  of  them  had  fallen, 
nor  been  struck  headless  by  lightning. 

The  village  was  alone.  The  winter  visitors  had  "gone 
inside" — that  is  to  say,  had  departed  to  the  cool  seashore 
at  San  Diego  and  Los  Angeles — and  the  community  had 
drawn  itself  together  for  its  long  summer  nap. 

There  was  room  for  the  moving-picture  people  and  Leva 
Lemaire  invited  Mem  to  share  her  room  in  one  of  the  hotel 
bungalows.  The  sun  sank  early  behind  the  vast  barricade 
of  the  San  Jacinto  chain,  rising  sheer  from  the  sand  and 
piling  height  upon  height  to  the  crest  ten  thousand  feet  in  air. 

The  mountains  were  blessed  now  with  a  mist  of  light 
that  the  aerial  prisms  gave  the  effect  of  down.  The  brutality 
of  the  sky  became  grace;  the  stark  nakedness  of  the  place 
was  here  covered  with  a  flesh  of  earth,  with  grass  and  flowers, 
and  with  the  larger  flowers  we  call  trees.  Mem  had  known 
the  oleander  as  a  tubbed  captive  at  home.  Here  it  was  a 
giant,  spreading  arms  in  a  benediction  of  fragrant  shade  and 
dangling  bouquets  that  brushed  her  hair  and  caught  her  hat. 
Palm  trees  of  vast  bole  hung  out  umbrellas  of  somber  green. 
Wan  cottonwoods  held  up  pallid  limbs  drooping  with  fuzz. 
Pepper  trees  let  their  tresses  droop.  The  ancient  and  honor 
able  black  fig  trees  of  the  famous  San  Gabriel  lineage,  date 
palms,  roses,  flowers,  and  shrubs  massed  and  running  wild 
about  the  rambling  gardens  seemed  miraculous  to  Mem, 
who  had  almost  forgotten,  in  the  dreary  hell  of  the  desert, 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  141 

that  green  things  had  ever  been  invented,  and  who  found 
herself  walking  deeper  and  deeper  into  a  revel  of  tropical 
luxury. 

There  were  Indians  here,  too — the  little  company  of 
Cahuillas;  one  old  buck,  with  hair  as  black  as  tar  drip  and 
as  long  as  his  hat  brim  was  broad,  stood  gravely  watering 
hollyhocks  with  a  garden  hose;  a  clump  of  broad  squaws 
worked  at  basket  weaving;  darting  through  the  streets 
young  Indian  girls  with  bobbed  hair  flopping  and  gingham 
skirts  flying,  bestrode  the  wide  horses  of  this  village. 

White  people  rode,  too — cowmen  from  the  ranches  beyond 
— and  children.  One  half -naked  little  girl  bounced  along 
the  lane  on  a  monstrous  horse  so  flat  of  back  that  she  might 
as  well  have  been  riding  a  galloping  plateau.  Yet  she  was 
chasing  home  a  troop  of  horses  as  big  as  her  own. 

"I  was  never  on  a  horse,"  Mem  sighed. 

"You'd  better  learn  to  ride,"  said  Leva  Lemaire.  "It 
comes  in  mighty  handy  in  this  business." 

"But  I'm  not  going  into  the  business!"  Mem  protested, 
hardly  able  to  push  one  foot  ahead  of  the  other.  "I've  had 
enough  for  the  rest  of  my  life." 

"That's  what  my  poor  husband  used  to  say  every  time  he 
recovered  from  a  spree.  And  he  never  took  another  drop — 
till  he  got  the  first  chance." 

But  Mem  knew  better.  She  was  too  tired  to  eat.  She 
wanted  to  lie  down  and  never  get  up.  Leva  guided  her  to 
the  bungalow  and  left  her. 

Just  to  be  cool,  just  to  be  still,  were  paradise  enow.  After 
a  time  a  porter  brought  her  her  suitcase.  Leva  had  managed 
to  find  it.  But  Mem  was  too  weary  to  change  her  clothes. 
She  dropped  into  a  chair  by  a  window  and  watched  a  tiny 
boy  drive  home  a  few  cattle,  watched  the  last  red  plumage 
fade  on  the  breast  of  the  mountains,  watched  the  first  star 
suddenly  shimmer  as  if  a  jewel  had  been  tossed  from  some 
where  on  the  sky.  Other  stars  twinkled  into  being  here, 
there,  there,  like  the  first  big  drops  of  rain,  and  soon  the 
whole  sky  was  spattered  with  them. 

The  moon  that  had  lurked  in  the  blistered  air  all  day 
unseen  turned  up  her  lamp  and  carried  it  somewhere  into  the 


142  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

sea  beyond  the  shore  of  the  horizon ;  carried  the  sky  with  it 
star  by  star.  The  moon  went  reluctantly,  but  the  Milky 
Way  seemed  to  gleam  with  added  radiance  when  she  was 
gone.  The  lights  in  the  homes  made  stars  on  earth  and 
gave  companionship  to  the  dreamy  night. 

At  length  Leva  came  along  the  path,  a  shadow  detaching 
itself  from  other  shadow.  She  was  full  of  high  spirits.  There 
had  been  great  hilarity  in  the  dining  room  of  the  Desert  Inn. 
She  was  still  restless,  and  she  urged  Mem  to  come  with  her 
and  bathe  in  the  hot  springs  of  the  Indian  reservation. 

Mem  was  enough  restored  by  now  to  feel  the  distress  of 
the  sand  that  filled  her  hair  and  her  clothes.  The  project 
had  a  tang  of  wild  adventure,  and  she  went  along,  taking 
clean  clothes  over  her  arm. 

They  walked  through  the  double  night  of  the  foliage- 
shrouded  streets,  the  palms  muttering  over  them  and 
blocking  their  way  on  the  irregular  paths. 

At  the  reservation  an  old  Indian  admitted  them  with  an 
utter  indifference  to  their  thrill  of  terror.  Inside  the  cabin, 
lighted  only  by  candles,  they  undressed  and  stretched  them 
selves  in  the  warm  water  thickened  with  sand.  It  crept 
about  them  with  an  uncanny  tingling  where  the  stream 
bubbled  from  the  depths.  It  was  a  weird,  a  spooky  bath, 
but  it  sent  them  forth  clothed  in  skins  reborn. 

When  they  drifted  past  the  hotel  they  heard  song  enriching 
the  night.  A  man's  voice  carried  the  burden  of  the  tune 
sonorously,  and  a  woman's  voice  oversoared  it  like  a  hovering 
nightingale's.  Or  so  Mem  thought  until  Leva  whispered: 

"That's  Robina  Teele  singing.    Pretty  voice,  hasn't  she?" 

"Beautiful!"  said  Mem,  but  begrudged  the  praise  with  a 
jealousy  that  surprised  her. 

"The  man  is  Tom  Holby,  I  think,"  said  Leva.  "Awfully 
nice  fellow.  Seems  to  have  taken  a  great  shine  to  you." 

"Nonsense!"  said  Mem,  oddly  quickened  by  the  thought 
and  a  little  alarmed  by  her  own  delight. 

"Well,  we  might  as  well  move  along,"  Leva  grumbled. 
"We're  only  extras  and  we  don't  belong  with  the  big  folks." 

Humbled  and  outcast,  but  without  resentment,  Mem  fol 
lowed  through  the  heavy  gloom,  suddenly  smothered  with 


SOULS   FOR   SALE  143 

loneliness  and  uselessness,  yet  panting  for  something  to  do, 
something  brilliant  and  tremendously  emotional,  like  the 
moment  of  desperate  passion  she  had  enacted  in  the  desert. 

She  wondered  what  the  photograph  would  look  like; 
wondered  if  she  would  ever  see  it,  if  anyone  else  would  ever 
see  it;  or  if  it  would  be  cut  out  as  Leva  had  suggested.  A 
terrible  thing  to  feel  fiercely  and  be  cut  out,  snuffed  like  a 
candle  flame  that  yearns  and  leaps  and  is  forever  as  if  it  had 
never  been. 

When  she  reached  the  cottage  she  was  very  weary  again. 
But  she  could  not  sleep  and  Leva  wanted  to  read.  There 
were  two  beds  in  the  room  and  Leva  sat  propped  up  by  a 
little  bed  light  that  painted  her  in  bright  vignette  against 
the  dark. 

After  a  long  stupor,  Mem  abruptly  wanted  to  know  some 
thing. 

"Are  the  moving-picture  people  very  wicked?"  she  heard 
herself  asking. 

Leva  stared  into  the  dark  where  Mem  lay,  and  she  laughed : 

"Very." 

Mem  sighed.    She  was  sorry  to  hear  it. 

"In  fact,"  Leva  went  on,  "I  don't  know  a  single  moving- 
picture  person  who  is  above  reproach."  She  finished  the 
page  and  turned  it  before  she  went  on.  "But  then,  neither 
do  I  know  a  single  person  in  any  other  walk  of  life  who  is 
above  reproach.  Everybody  I  ever  heard  of  is  full  of  sin. 
The  Bible  says  that  we  all  fell  with  Adam — and  Eve.  So  I 
suppose  it's  only  natural  that  movie  people  should  be  as 
faulty  as  everybody  else  is.  But  I  can't  see  that  they're  any 
wickeder  than  anybody  else." 

"Really?"  Mem  cried,  hoisting  herself  to  an  elbow. 

"Really.  Most  movie  people  are  stodgy  and  untempera- 
mental  and  nice,  everydayish,  folksy  souls.  They  work 
hard  when  they  can,  and  save  their  money,  and  raise  families, 
and  have  children  and  spats  and  diseases  and  petty  vices 
like  everybody  else.  A  few  wild  ones  make  a  splurge  and 
get  in  the  papers. 

"  But  if  you  read  the  papers  you  see  all  the  professions  and 
trades  represented  in  the  scandals.  The  other  day  the 


144  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

front  page  told  about  a  preacher  who  ran  away  with  a  girl 
in  the  choir  and  left  a  wife  and  several  children  behind  him. 
But  nobody  spoke  about  the  danger  of  letting  girls  sing  in 
choirs.  Yet  choirs  are  dangerous,  Heaven  knows." 

She  could  not  see  how  Mem  trembled  at  this  random 
arrow  that  struck  home.  Mem  was  sorry  she  spoke  and 
asked  no  more  questions.  But  Leva  needed  no  further 
prompting. 

"I've  tried  a  lot  of  trades — stenographer,  nurse,  canvass 
ing  for  magazine  subscriptions,  clerking  in  a  store,  and  just 
plain  home  life — and  there  was  mischief  everywhere.  Don't 
believe  all  this  talk  you  hear,  honey,  or  put  it  in  its  proper 
proportion.  There  were  no  movies  twenty-five  years  ago, 
but  Satan  is  a  million  years  old,  and  he  hasn't  taken  a  day 
or  a  night  off  yet.  I  used  to  know  a  piece  about  'Satan 
finds  some  mischief  still  for  idle  hands  to  do,'  but  he  has 
enough  left  over  for  busy  hands,  too.  Are  you  thinking  of 
staying  in  the  movies?" 

"No." 

"Afraid  of  them?" 

"No— o." 

"You've  got  a  good  start.  You've  made  a  hit  with  a  star 
and  a  director  the  first  day.  Lord!  I've  been  at  it  two 
years  and  still  dubbing  along.  Better  keep  at  it." 

"No,  thank  you." 

" Don't  thank  me ! "  said  Leva.  "I'm  nobody.  I  couldn't 
be  of  any  help  except  to  find  you  a  good  boarding  house 
and  an  agent.  But  if  you  ever  come  up  to  Los  Angeles — 
I'll  give  you  the  address  to-morrow.  Don't  let  me  forget." 

"I  won't." 

Leva  returned  to  her  book,  the  turning  of  every  page 
slashing  Mem's  mood  like  a  knife.  She  was  thinking  that 
she  was  not  good  enough  even  for  the  movies. 

Her  sin  had  led  her  to  the  edge  of  this  paradise,  and  then 
drawn  her  back  by  the  hair.  She  was  doomed  to  spend  a 
certain  time  in  increasing  heaviness,  and  then  to  die  or  to 
go  about  thenceforth  with  a  nameless  child  at  her  breast 
or  trudging  at  her  side,  holding  on  to  her  hand  and  anchor 
ing  her  to  obscurity. 


CHAPTER  XXII 

WAKENED  by  the  sound  of  rushing  waters,  she  ran 
barefoot  to  the  window.  There  was  no  sign  of 
rain  in  that  hard,  marbled  sky.  The  mountains  looked  as 
if  rain  had  never  dampened  them. 

She  could  not  think  just  what  their  color  reminded  her  of 
for  a  time.  Then  she  recalled  the  burnt  sugared  almonds 
heaped  in  the  window  of  Calverly's  one  candy  store.  How 
she  had  loved  them!  But  this  scorched,  mottled-brown 
mountain  range  had  no  sweetness,  only  inconceivable  bulk. 

Still  the  vrater  gurgled.  She  saw  that  the  yard  about 
the  bungalow,  soft  and  dusty  last  night,  was  now  a  shallow 
lake  with  waters  dancing  everywhere.  She  thrust  her  head 
out  of  the  window  and  drew  it  in  again,  for  a  Jap  was  shutting 
the  water  gates  of  an  overflowing  trough  extending  as  far 
as  she  could  see. 

It  was  an  irrigation  ditch.  He  was  flooding  the  ground 
before  the  sun  could  turn  the  water  into  burning  lenses. 
She  was  to  learn  that  the  desert  irrigated  yields  more  richly 
than  rich  soil  untended ;  just  as  common  human  soil  responds 
with  miracles  to  lavish  floods  of  encouragement. 

A  boy  from  the  main  building  of  the  hotel  came  skipping 
across  the  lawn  to  waken  Leva,  who  must  be  up  betimes. 
Mem  would  not  yield  to  her  appeals  that  she  should  come 
along  and  resume  the  moving-picture  work.  She  would 
taste  no  more  of  the  forbidden  cup. 

She  put  aside  especially  the  temptation  to  be  near  Tom 
Holby  and  to  taste  the  wine  of  his  approval  and  his  thought- 
fulness.  Temptation,  like  love,  follows  who  flees. 

Mem  went  back  to  bed,  but,  goaded  by  discontent,  rose, 
bathed,  and  dressed,  and  went  to  the  hotel  for  breakfast, 
determined  that  she  would  inquire  at  once  the  way  to  the 
Randies  ranch  and  take  up  her  humble  future  before  her 
funds  were  further  diminished. 


146  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

The  dining  room  was  deserted  save  for  one  man,  and 
that  was  Tom  Holby. 

"Hello!"  he  cried.  "Come  sit  with  me.  You're  not 
working?  Neither  am  I.  I'm  a  gentleman  till  this  afternoon. 
They're  taking  shots  that  I'm  not  in,  so  I  slept  late.  Our 
poor  star,  Robina,  is  out  in  the  gas  stove,  turning  herself 
into  a  fricassee  while  I  loll  at  ease. 

"She  is  being  kidnaped  to-day  by  a  roving  band  of  bad 
Arabs.  I  was  just  starting  to  rescue  her  yesterday,  disguised 
as  a  sheik  or  something,  when  I  fell  in  with  the  famine  mob. 
I  rescued  her  last  week  up  on  the  lot  in  Los  Angeles." 

Mem  looked  so  bewildered  that  he  explained:  "You  see, 
we  built  a  whole  Arabian  street  on  the  lot,  and  I  broke  in 
and  broke  out  and  broke  up  all  the  furniture,  tearing  Robina 
from  the  villains.  Then  we  came  down  here  to  take  the 
scenes  of  her  capture.  You'll  get  used  to  this  upside-down 
business  when  you've  been  in  the  movies  a  while  longer." 

"I've  been  in  them  as  long  as  I'm  going  to  be!" 

"Oh  no,  you  haven't!"  Holby  laughed.  "I  wouldn't 
blame  you  for  quitting  if  every  day  were  like  yesterday, 
but  you  got  the  worst  of  it  at  the  first.  I've  never  known 
a  day  like  yesterday,  but  you'll  not  be  likely  to  have  another 
in  a  thousand  years." 

"I  loved  it." 

"Then  why  are  you  quitting?" 

She  could  not  tell  him  the  truth  and  no  lie  occurred  to 
her,  so  she  simply  drew  a  veil  across  her  eyes  and  left  him  to 
his  own  surmises.  It  was  not  his  nature  to  persist  when 
a  woman  rebuffed  him,  even  though  that  was  a  rare  experi 
ence  with  him.  He  waived  the  mystery  as  her  own  affair, 
and  spoke  up  cheerily: 

"Order  a  good  breakfast  and  come  with  me  to  the  Palm 
Canon.  They  say  it's  glorious.  It  will  buck  you  up  and  save 
me  from  the  horrors  of  solitude." 

He  took  an  unfair  advantage  of  her  by  appealing  to  her 
charity  again.  It  was  the  best  way  to  tyrannize  over  her. 

She  consented  for  lack  of  ability  to  imagine  a  polite 
excuse,  and  finished  her  breakfast  while  he  went  in  search 
of  a  car. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  147 

He  came  back  with  a  rusty  flivver  which  he  drove  himself. 

There  were  seven  miles  of  road  winding  in  all  directions, 
especially  up  and  down.  She  praised  Holby  for  the  skill 
with  which  he  kept  his  hands  and  feet  playing. 

"I  had  to  drive  one  of  these  in  my  last  picture,"  he  said. 
"You  have  to  handle  nearly  everything  in  the  pictures. 
I've  driven  a  stagecoach  pursued  by  Indians  through  canons; 
and  a  coach  and  four  down  Fifth  Avenue;  and  a  donkey 
chaise  in  a  London  scene;  and  a  side  car  in  an  imitation 
Ireland,  a  motor  boat,  a  street  car,  a  caterpillar  tractor, 
an  airship,  a  chariot,  and  a  steam  shovel.  Talented  lad, 
eh  ?  Look !  Did  you  see  that  ? ' ' 

Mem  had  seen  it.  A  long  rope  of  scarlet  silk  ran  across 
the  road  and  threaded  the  sagebrush  as  if  a  red  lasso  had 
learned  to  flee  of  its  own  volition.  It  was  a  scarlet  racer. 

"Lots  of  snakes  along  here,  but  mostly  harmless,"  he 
said.  "Robina  loves  snakes.  Do  you?" 

Her  shivering  repugnance  answered  for  her. 

After  a  time  they  passed  a  patch  of  ground  a  little  drearier 
than  the  rest  of  the  landscape.  It  had  been  cleared  once, 
and  a  wooden  cross  erected  there.  Holby  answered  her 
questioning  stare. 

"That's  probably  the  grave  of  some  poor  fellow  who  died 
of  thirst.  A  villager  was  telling  me  last  night  that  only 
last  week  a  man  was  found  dead  within  a  mile  of  his  ranch. 
He  was  that  near  to  good  water,  but  he  couldn't  make  the 
distance.  Out  of  his  mind,  probably.  They  said  he  was 
almost  naked.  Men  who  are  dying  for  water  have  a  queer 
mania  for  tearing  off  their  clothes." 

Mem  was  startled.  She  had  heard  this  very  fact  from 
the  man  in  Yuma.  She  had  decided  to  let  Mr.  Woodville 
die  of  thirst.  It  seemed  odiously  cruel  now  to  subject  even 
an  imaginary  man  to  such  a  death.  This  reminded  her 
that  she  had  not  yet  explained  to  Mr.  Holby  the  puzzle  of 
her  name. 

He  had  evidently  dismissed  it  from  his  mind,  for  he  was 
running  on: 

"I  don't  suppose  the  pictures  can  show  anybody  dying 
of  thirst  nowr,  with  a  censor  in  full  power.  They  believe  in 


148  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

clothes  and  lots  of  'em.  It  looks  as  if  they'd  make  the 
moving  pictures  die  of  thirst  just  in  sight  of  the  promised 
land.  Just  as  the  hard  times  are  coming  on,  the  censors 
rise  up  like  a  sandstorm  and  blow  from  all  directions.  You 
can  hardly  find  a  story  that  can  stand  their  sand  blast. 
They  eat  away  the  plot  till  it  falls  with  a  crash — just  as — 
see  that  telephone  pole  chewed  away  by  the  sand  that  blows 
all  the  time  against  it?  Well,  that's  what  the  censors  are 
doing  to  the  picture  game.  If  they  don't  topple  the  whole 
thing  over  it  won't  be  their  fault.  But  what  will  they  do 
for  salaries,  then? 

' '  In  some  of  the  states  they  cut  out  all  reference  to  expected 
children.  Would  you  believe  it?  They  cut  out  a  scene 
where  a  workingman  came  home  and  found  his  wife  making 
little  clothes  and  rejoiced  and  was  proud!  Was  ever  any 
body  on  earth  as  indecent  and  filthy-minded  as  a  prude? 
All  crime  and  sin  are  pretty  well  forbidden,  also.  Hideous, 
isn't  it,  that  grown  people  in  a  grown-up  country  called 
the  land  of  the  free  and  the  home  of  the  brave  should  be 
bullied  and  handcuffed  till  we  can't  even  tell  a  story?  We 
can't  play  Shakespeare,  of  course,  or  the  Bible  stories,  or 
any  of  the  big  literary  works  any  more. 

"And  they  do  it  all  in  the  name  of  protecting  morals! 
— as  if  girls  and  boys  never  went  wrong  until  the  movies 
came  along;  as  if  you  could  stop  human  beings  from  being 
human  by  closing  up  the  theaters  and  telling  lies  to  the 
children ! 

"But  there's  no  use  whining.  We'll  have  to  take  our 
paregoric.  The  crookeder  the  politician  the  more  anxious 
he  is  to  win  over  the  bigots.  If  he'll  give  them  the  censor 
ship  and  a  few  other  idiotic  tyrannies  they  won't  interfere 
with  his  graft." 

Soon  they  arrived  at  Palm  Canon  and  ran  the  car  well 
up  into  the  gorge,  along  a  water  that  descended  a  winding 
stair  with  little  cascades  and  broad  pools.  In  some  of  them 
water  snakes  could  be  seen  twisting  shadowily. 

But  the  wonder  of  the  place  was  the  embassy  of  stately 
palms  that  had  marched  down  the  ravine  to  the  edge  of  the 
desert  and  greeted  the  visitor  with  the  majesty  of  lofty 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  149 

chieftains  in  great  war  bonnets  of  green  plumes.  Some  were 
tall  and  slender,  with  headdresses  of  fronded  glory.  Others 
were  short  and  fat  and  so  shaggy  of  trunk  that  they  resem 
bled  the  legs  of  giant  cowboys  in  chaparajos. 

There  was  a  little  cabin  halfway  up  the  canon,  but  it  was 
locked  and  deserted.  On  a  bulletin  board  were  placards 
begging  for  mercy  to  animalkind  and  praising  nakedness  as 
akin  to  godliness. 

"He  ought  to  be  on  a  censorship  board,"  said  Holby. 

The  hermit  who  kept  this  retreat  was  making  good  his 
creed,  for  when  Mem  and  Holby  got  out  of  their  car  and 
stared  from  the  edge  of  the  barrier  down  into  a  stream 
meandering  through  an  Eden  of  shade,  they  saw  him  naked 
at  his  bath. 

Both  pretended  not  to  have  noticed  him  and  turned  away. 
Before  long  he  came  up  the  steep  path  in  apostolic  garb 
with  robe,  rope  girdle,  sandals,  and  staff.  He  wore  a  beard 
and  long  chestnut  curls  as  in  the  tradition  of  the  Messiah. 

"How  easy  it  is  to  look  like  the  pictures  of  Christ!"  Tom 
Holby  said.  It  angered  him  a  little  to  meet  a  man  whose 
ideals  and  practices  were  so  contrary  to  his  own. 

The  hermit  lived  on  next  to  nothing,  took  no  part  in  the 
activities  of  mankind,  hid  himself  in  obscurity,  and  led  a 
life  of  sanctified  indolence.  He  did  not  mortify  his  flesh,  and 
he  did  not  follow  the  mediaeval  theory  that  baths  are  dia 
bolic  and  dirt  divine.  He  was  neat  and  even  his  nails  were 
manicured  with  care. 

But  he  made  no  use  of  his  body  for  the  public  good  or 
gayety.  He  abstained  from  beauty  and  suppressed  his  emo 
tions.  Tom  Holby,  by  the  very  opposite  ambition,  treated 
his  flesh  as  an  instrument  of  many  uses;  he  diverted  millions 
of  people,  and  his  prosperity  was  gauged  by  the  delight  he 
gave  in  quality  and  quantity.  He  was  so  far  from  seeking 
oblivion  that  his  very  postures  were  multiplied  and  sent 
about  the  world. 

The  ambitions  of 'the  two  men  were  of  mutual  criticism 
and  reproach. 

Yet  Holby  was  polite  to  the  polite  hermit  who  invited 
the  wanderers  into  his  neat  little  cabin,  sold  them  postal 


SOULS    FOR    SALE 

cards  with  views  of  the  canon,  then  with  a  most  unhermit- 
like  skill  played  them  love  tunes  on  an  Hawaiian  guitar  of 
his  own  making.  He  held  in  his  right  hand  a  bar  of  steel 
with  which  he  gave  his  melodies  a  quaint  sliding  tone,  an 
amorous  whimper  of  a  squirrellike  pathos. 

From  this  cozy  retreat  Holby  led  Mem  down  to  the 
center  of  the  palm  haunt.  He  was  thinking  aloud: 

"Funny  business,  being  a  professional  good  man.  That 
sort  of  fellow  hates  the  world  and  is  afraid  of  it  and  retires 
to  the  desert  to  save  his  soul.  Always  seemed  to  me  there 
was  something  lacking  in  that  idea  of  being  good.  Save 
your  own  soul  and  let  the  world  go  to  the  devil!  It  means 
nothing  to  the  hermit  whether  there  is  war  or  peace,  famine 
or  prosperity.  He  doesn't  help  any  lonely  people  to  smile; 
he  doesn't  feed  anybody,  or  give  any  money  to  anybody;  he 
doesn't  build  any  railroads  or  cathedrals  or  theaters,  paint 
any  pictures  or  write  any  songs  or  vote  or  make  shoes  or 
anything.  He  doesn't  commit  any  sins,  maybe — any  of  the 
crowd  sins — but  he  doesn't  commit  any  good  deeds,  either. 

"Still,  if  a  man  is  so  excited  about  his  soul,  it's  better  if 
he  will  go  away  by  himself  and  save  it  than  to  spend  his  life 
trying  to  save  everybody  else's  soul  by  censorships  and 
foolish  laws  about  tobacco  and  Sunday  and  art  and  every 
thing." 

In  the  depth  of  the  canon  the  palms  were  densely  congre 
gated;  their  branches  interlaced  into  a  roof  of  murmurous 
green.  Mem  was  in  a  mood  of  beyond  the  world;  she 
felt  bewitched  as  she  walked  over  the  dried  fans  of  fallen 
leaves  and  listened  to  the  birds  that  made  a  lyric  caravan 
sary  of  this  haven.  It  was  a  realm  of  Arabian  magic,  with 
no  hint  of  the  American  magic  that  our  familiar  eyes  ignore. 

Mem  dropped  wearily  down  upon  a  stone  by  the  brook  in 
a  thatched  tent  of  palms.  Tom  Holby,  though  there  was  a 
place  at  a  distance,  sat  down  at  her  side. 

This  threw  her  heart  into  a  flutter.  His  own  heart  was 
evidently  on  the  scurry,  too,  and  there  was  a  fierce  debate 
within  him  whether  he  should  speak  or  not.  Finally  he  said: 

"You've  got  me  at  a  terrible  disadvantage  here.  I'm  all 
alone  with  you,  and  helpless.  It  wouldn't  do  me  any  good 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  151 

to  scream  and  I'm  so  weak  that  you  could  overpower  me 
with  a  look." 

She  could  not  make  him  out  at  all.  He  had  to  explain, 
baldly: 

"You  know  when  a  woman  lures  a  man  out  to  a  solitude 
like  this—" 

"Lures?" 

"Well,  use  any  word  you  like — just  say  'goes  with  a 
man ' — anyway,  she  sets  the  poor  fellow  to  guessing  mighty 
hard.  I  wouldn't  annoy  you  for  worlds.  I've  got  a  queer 
hankering  to  be  of  some  service  to  you.  But  I  can't  place 
you  anywhere." 

She  did  not  know  his  language. 

"Can't  place  you  at  all.  You  have  a  sweet,  innocent, 
beautiful  face  and  your  eyes  are  as  gentle  as  a  dove's.  But 
that  has  been  the  case  with  some  of  the  daintiest  little 
desperadoes  that  ever  tore  up  society.  The  first  time  I 
met  you  you  told  me  your  name  was  Remember  Steddon. 
You  called  me  Mr.  Woodville  when  we  said  good-by  in  Tuc 
son.  A  week  or  two  and  we  meet  again,  and  you  are  Mrs. 
Woodville  and  your  husband  is  dead  and  you're  going  to  be 
a  chambermaid  on  a  ranch. 

"It's  all  possible,  but  it  isn't  a  bit  convincing,  and  you've 
got  me  puzzled.  If  you've  committed  a  crime  and  are 
hiding  out  you'd  better  get  into  a  bigger  crowd,  because 
you're  as  conspicuous  out  here  as  old  San  Jacinto  peak. 
If  you've  committed  a  crime,  I'm  sure  you  had  a  good  reason 
to  and  I'm  no  informer.  But  I  wish  you  would  tell  me 
whether  you  are  the  cleverest  adventuress  I  ever  met  or  just 
a  poor  scared  little  lonely  lost  child." 

Her  confusion  was  that  of  a  child.  He  could  see  no  trace 
of  insincerity  in  her  panic  and  there  was  a  wedding  ring  on 
her  finger.  But  this  did  not  impress  him  much;  he  had 
seen  too  many  married  actresses  take  off  their  rings  to  play 
maidens,  and  too  many  unmarried  actresses  put  them  on 
to  play  wives.  He  had  seen  wonderful  sincerity  in  imperson 
ation.  Robina  could  make  him  weep  almost  at  will  in  her 
scenes  of  hapless  innocence.  He  broke  out  impatiently  when 
Mem  did  not  speak. 


i52  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

"Tell  me  honestly  one  thing,  Is  there  a  Mr.  Woodville? 
Were  you  ever  really  married  to  anybody?" 

She  turned  frightened  eyes  upon  him  and  spoke  with  a 
parrying  evasion: 

"Why,  why  should  you  doubt  it?" 

He  stared  at  her  sharply;  then  his  eyes  softened  and  he 
mumbled : 

"You  poor  little  thing!  What  on  earth  are  you  up  to? 
What  are  you  running  away  from?  Why  should  you  come 
to  this  place  out  of  season  under  a  false  name  with  a  wedding 
ring  you  bought  yourself?" 

She  carried  her  other  hand  to  conceal  the  ring  as  if  it  were 
a  shameful  baby.  The  instinctive  gesture  convinced  Holby 
that  he  had  guessed  well. 

Now  she  fell  into  an  ague  of  terror.  She  looked  this  way 
and  that,  as  if  for  a  door  of  escape.  But  she  knew  that  on 
all  sides  of  her  was  a  wilderness  of  mountains  and  desert. 
She  was  horribly  afraid  of  Holby;  he  had  the  domineering, 
demanding  manner  of  a  police  officer. 

But  instead  of  denouncing  her  or  arresting  her,  he  sud 
denly  took  her  two  trembling  hands  in  one  of  his  and  with 
the  other  pressed  her  to  him  and  held  her  tight. 

She  struggled  fiercely,  yet  with  the  feeling  of  a  lamb  in  a 
shepherd's  clasp.  She  knew  that  he  was  no  enemy,  yet  she 
could  not  accept  him  as  her  friend  on  so  short  an  acquaint 
ance.  Friendships  were  not  made  at  such  speed  in  Calverly. 

So  she  fought  until  he  released  her.  Then  she  rose  and 
staggered  along  a  crackling  path,  scattering  little  lizards 
that  seemed  rather  to  pretend  than  to  feel  fear. 

She  began  to  weep,  ran  blindly  into  one  of  the  palms,  and 
fell,  but  into  Holby's  arms  again. 

"Tell  me  the  truth,"  he  pleaded.  "Let  me  be  your  friend. 
I  want  to  help  you.  If  it  would  help  you  most  to  let  you 
alone,  I'll  do  that.  If  it  would  help  you  to  be  held  tight  and 
hugged  hard  and  kissed  and  loved — I'll  do  that,  and  mighty 
gladly.  But  in  Heaven's  name,  don't  stand  there  and  have 
chills  and  fever  and  not  speak!" 

She  felt  a  mad  yearning  to  tell  him  the  truth.  She  felt 
that  he  would  be  very  merciful  and  wise  and  everything 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  153 

wonderful.  She  felt  that  he  would  not  be  shocked.  Those 
actors  and  actresses  could  not  be  shocked  by  anything, 
probably.  And  yet  a  kind  of  snobbishness  even  in  humilia 
tion  locked  her  jaws  on  her  secret.  She  was  a  clergyman's 
daughter,  after  all,  and  it  would  be  an  appalling  come-down 
from  all  her  teaching,  to  make  a  movie  actor  her  confidant 
and  accept  his  advice  and  help  and — Heavens!  she  was 
already  accepting  his  caresses! 

Mem  was  a  princess  of  the  parsonage,  and  she  was  sud 
denly  recalled  to  her  pride  of  estate. 

"Please!"  she  said,  quite  haughtily.     "Oh,  please!" 

Tom  Holby  writhed  when  his  generous  motives  were  flung 
back  into  his  face.  He  was  filled  with  rage,  and  yet  he 
pitied  her  more  than  ever.  He  pitied  her  as  the  vagabond 
pities  the  hidebound  Puritan  who  sets  him  in  the  pillory. 

He  longed  for  such  freedom  and  equality  as  he  enjoyed  in 
his  wrangles  with  Robina  Teele,  who  swore  at  him  and 
struck  at  him  with  a  manly  vigor. 

He  controlled  himself  and  groaned  an  ironic: 

"Forgive  me!" 

When  she  ingenuously  answered,  "I  do,"  he  almost 
suffocated  with  tormented  wrath  and  sardonic  amusement. 

He  dumfounded  her  by  speaking  in  the  jargon  of  his 
craft: 

"They  say  that  when  Griffith  wanted  to  get  the  final 
grimace  of  agony  in  Lillian  Gish's  face  in  the  scene  where  her 
illegitimate  baby  dies — in  'Way  Down  East,'  you  know — 
they  photographed  her  face  while  he  held  her  feet  and 
tickled  them.  I  don't  know  how  true  the  story  is,  but  I 
feel  just  that  way.  Do  I  look  it?" 

He  was  so  interested  in  expression  that  he  actually  thrust 
his  face  close  to  hers  for  her  verdict  on  his  mien.  She  had 
still  another  baffler  for  him: 

"Who's  Griffith?" 

This  heathenish  ignorance  of  the  first  god  of  the  American 
cinema,  took  his  breath  like  a  blow  on  the  solar  plexus  and 
he  could  only  whisper,  huskily: 

"Let's  go  back." 

11 


CHAPTER  XXIII 

WHEN  the  moving-picture  caravan  left  Palm  Springs, 
Mem  lost  the  courage  that  had  led  her  to  refuse  to 
go  with  it. 

Tom  Holby  rather  coldly  advised  her  to  take  up  the  moving 
pictures  as  a  career.  The  director  praised  her  and  promised 
not  to  forget  her.  Leva  Lemaire  begged  her  to  come  to  Los 
Angeles,  where  it  would  be  cool  and  profitable,  and  warned 
her  not  to  risk  her  life  in  the  desert.  Also  she  collected  for 
Mem  the  day's  wage  of  seven  dollars  and  a  half  for  her  work 
as  an  extra  woman.  This  thrilled  the  girl  with  her  astonish 
ing  earning  powers.  At  that  rate  she  could  earn  as  much  in 
a  week  as  her  father  earned  in  a  month.  Even  she ! 

But  Mem  would  as  soon  have  followed  a  pack  of  gypsies 
or  a  circus  troupe  out  of  Calverly.  It  was  only  when  the 
movie  people  were  gone  that  she  realized  how  much  they 
had  filled  the  scene,  how  empty  and  little  the  stage  was, 
now  that  the  picture  crowd  abandoned  it. 

She  found  a  place  as  maid  in  the  home  of  a  storekeeper  at 
such  wages  as  he  could  afford.  She  began  the  sordid  routine 
of  her  tasks,  but,  contrasting  them  with  the  glamour  of  play 
ing  tragic  roles,  she  felt  herself  entombed. 

Then  the  summer  heat  began  and  grew  so  fierce  that  her 
employer's  wife  and  children  went  "inside"  to  the  seashore. 
This  left  her  in  a  position  of  embarrassment  and  terror. 
She  was  an  embarrassment  and  terror  to  her  employer,  too; 
for  she  had  a  beauty  that  she  unwittingly  flung  over  him  like 
a  net.  Her  beauty  stung  him  in  his  thoughts.  It  filled  his 
honest  soul  with  poisonous  desire.  He  tried  to  summon 
courage  to  send  her  away,  but  the  sorrow  in  her  eyes  made 
it  impossible  to  dismiss  her.  Finally,  being  as  wise  as  he 
was  good,  he  determined  to  flee  from  the  temptation  to  tempt 
and  took  shelter  with  his  wife. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  155 

Mem  had  not  watched  him  well  enough  to  note  her  influ 
ence  upon  him.  She  went  about  in  a  daze,  with  heavier  and 
heavier  heart  and  tread. 

She  spent  much  thought  upon  the  letter  home  that  she 
had  not  yet  written,  that  she  must  write  if  ever  she  were  to 
go  home  again.  The  whole  purpose  of  this  long,  long  journey 
into  loneliness  was  to  be  able  to  write  that  letter;  and  it  had 
not  yet  gone. 

Every  time  she  made  the  beginning  her  hands  flinched 
from  the  lying  pen.  But  when  her  employer  left  the  village 
for  a  few  days  with  his  family  at  the  coast,  one  night  in  a 
frantic  fit  of  histrionic  enthusiasm  she  dashed  off  her  fable, 
sealed  it  in  an  envelope,  and  dropped  it  after  dark  in  the 
mail  box. 

DARLING  MAMMA  AND  PAPA, — 

How  can  I  write  the  terrible  news?  I  can  hardly  bear  to  think 
of  it,  let  alone  write  about  it.  But  my  darling  husband  passed  away 
in  the  desert.  I  cannot  write  you  the  particulars  now,  for  I  am  too 
agitated  and  grief  stricken  and  I  do  not  want  to  harrow  you  with 
details.  I  know  your  poor  hearts  will  ache  for  me,  but  I  beg  you 
not  to  feel  it  too  deeply,  because  I  am  trying  to  be  brave.  And  I 
remember  what  you  taught  me,  that  the  Lord  giveth  and  the  Lord 
taketh  away. 

Poor  John  did  not  find  the  lost  mine  he  was  looking  for,  and  he 
did  not  find  the  water  hole  he  expected,  for,  after  I  had  waited  for 
him  a  long  time  in  our  camp  by  a  little  spring,  another  prospector 
brought  me  word  that  he  had  found  him  and  buried  him.  The  poor 
boy  had  torn  all  his  clothes  off  in  the  thirst  madness  and  had  been 
dead  for  three  days  when  found. 

I  cannot  write  you  more  now.  I  am  in  no  need  of  money  and  I 
will  come  home  when  I  get  a  little  stronger.  The  climate  is  doing 
my  health  wonderful  good  even  if  it  has  broken  my  heart. 

But  don't  you  worry.  I'll  be  all  right  and  I'll  send  you  a  long 
letter  as  soon  as  I  settle  down  somewhere. 

All  the  love  in  the  world  from 

Your  loveing 

MEM. 

After  she  had  slipped  the  letter  irrevocably  into  the  mail 
box  she  realized  that  the  postmark  of  Palm  Springs  would 


156  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

be  stamped  on  the  envelope.  Her  place  of  concealment 
would  be  disclosed. 

Still,  it  would  not  matter.  She  was  a  widow  now  in  the 
minds  of  her  people  and  she  could  go  back  to  them  and  face 
the  future  in  calm.  But,  she  would  have  to  go  on  playing  a 
part  all  her  life — and  playing  it  once  more  in  the  monotonous 
theater  of  her  own  home. 

She  had  a  fierce  desire  for  her  mother's  help  in  the  ap 
proaching  ordeal,  but  how  could  she  endure  it  to  begin  lying 
again  in  her  dear  old  father's  trusting  face? 

Her  soul  wanted  to  run  and  climb,  leaden  as  her  feet  were. 
She  was  a  bit  flighty  in  her  head  at  times,  nowadays.  A 
longing  for  cool  waters  and  icy  waves  assailed  her.  The 
Los  Angeles  paper  which  came  to  the  house  every  day  spoke 
of  Santa  Monica  as  the  place  "  where  the  mountains  meet 
the  sea." 

That  phrase  had  an  hallucinative  influence.  She  imagined 
the  vast  herd  of  mountains  crowding  down  to  meet  the 
radiant  breakers  that  the  Pacific  flung  upon  their  shining 
horns  as  they  bent  to  dip  their  muzzles  into  the  surf. 

The  ocean  was  so  near  to  Palm  Springs  that  her  employer 
spoke  of  having  breakfasted  once  on  the  beach  and  reached 
home  long  before  dinner  time.  And  that  was  by  the  winding 
motor  roads  to  the  Northwest. 

The  fantastic  notion  came  to  her  that  she  might  climb 
the  San  Jacinto  sierra  and  cross  it  to  the  ocean  as  the  eagles 
did,  or  at  least  catch  a  glimpse  of  blue  waves. 

The  mountains  had  a  beckoning  look  always,  and  on  this 
afternoon,  when  a  clouded  sky  gave  a  little  shelter  from  the 
sun,  she  set  out  to  follow  her  vagary  as  far  as  her  strength 
would  take  her. 

She  crossed  a  strip  of  sand  as  soft  as  deep-piled  velvet, 
and  came  to  a  path  that  slanted  up  a  rounded  cliff  lifting  a 
granite  wall  right  aloft  from  the  unrippled  surface  of  the 
desert. 

The  exertion  of  climbing  was  more  than  Mem  had  bar 
gained  for.  She  was  weaker  and  weightier  than  she  had 
thought.  The  steeps  that  looked  so  inviting  from  a  distance 
were  ragged  and  forbidding.  The  burnt-almond  mountains 


SOULS    FOR   SALE  157 

were  hot  and  sharp-edged  gridirons  to  her  feet.  When  she 
was  high  enough  to  look  down  on  the  leafy  thatch  of  the 
little  village  she  grew  dizzy  and  afraid. 

The  loneliness  up  there  was  grisly.  Something  said,  "Go 
back!"  She  fought  the  everlasting  tendency  to  retreat 
from  everything  she  undertook,  but  gave  up  and  decided  to 
return. 

And  now,  as  she  stared  at  the  swift  descent  before  her, 
she  grew  more  afraid  of  climbing  down  than  of  climbing  up. 
She  hesitated,  then  mounted  a  few  steps  with  pain  and 
struggle. 

She  had  not  the  strength  to  go  on,  nor  the  courage  to  go 
back.  The  sun  came  blazing  forth  and  seemed  to  spill  upon 
her  a  yellow  hot  mass  of  metal  that  slashed  her  about  the 
head  and  rolled  over  her  shoulders  in  blistering  ingots. 

The  fiends  of  height  swirled  round  her.  She  tried  to  call 
for  help — but  whence?  A  stone  rolled  under  her  foot  and 
shook  her  from  her  balance.  She  wavered,  clutched  at 
nothing,  whirled,  struck,  bounded  from  the  hard  rock,  fell 
and  fell,  and  then — a  smashing  blow,  blackness,  silence. 


CHAPTER  XXIV 

A  YOUNG  Indian  girl  chasing  her  stray  pony  about  the 
sand  had  noted  the  figure  climbing  the  side  of  the 
cliff,  and  had  studied  it,  wondering  at  its  erratic  behavior. 

She  had  seen  Mem  stumble,  then  fall;  had  heard  the 
thump  of  the  body  on  the  cushioning  sand;  had  run  to  the 
nearest  house  and  told  what  she  had  seen. 

A  man  there  came  out  and  followed  the  Indian  girl.  When 
she  pointed  to  the  height  where  Mem  had  stood  when  she 
slipped,  he  said: 

"That's  all  of  sixty  feet.    She's  dead  for  sure." 

But  she  was  not,  though  she  was  lifeless  enough  when 
they  reached  her,  and  more  than  one  bone  was  broken. 

A  woman  had  tried  to  kill  herself  a  few  weeks  before  by 
jumping  from  a  far  higher  cliff,  and,  landing  on  sand  as 
soft,  had  wakened,  to  her  keen  disappointment,  in  this 
world  instead  of  the  other,,  with  a  few  more  bruises  and 
anguishes  than  before. 

The  Indian  girl  dispelled  the  natural  suspicion  that  Mem 
had  attempted  suicide.  Her  first  outcry  when  she  was 
brought  back  to  consciousness  was  a  shriek  of  terror  that 
resumed  her  thoughts  where  they  had  left  off. 

She  was  recognized  and  taken  home.  The  village  doctor 
was  fetched,  and  he  did  all  that  his  skill  could  do  to  hasten 
the  repairs  that  nature  began  upon  at  once. 

Though  Mem  had  never  dared  to  visit  the  doctor,  he 
knew  of  her,  and  knew  of  her  as  a  widow.  The  wedding 
ring  on  her  finger  forestalled  even  a  thought  of  the  truth. 

When  she  was  strong  enough  to  be  talked  to  he  prepared 
her  for  bad  news. 

"Am  I  to  be  crippled  for  life?"  she  cried. 

"No,"  he  sighed.  "You  will  bear  no  marks  of  your 
accident.  But  you  will  not — but  your  other  hopes  and 
expectations — will  not  be  realized." 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  159 

She  was  dazed  and  he  was  timid,  and  he  had  some  diffi 
culty  in  making  her  understand  his  bad  news:  that  she 
would  not  be  a  mother. 

She  bore  this  blow  with  a  fortitude  that  surprised  him. 

Before  she  was  able  to  be  up  and  about,  the  family  came 
back  and  ministered  to  her  with  a  kindness  that  punished 
her.  One  morning  she  was  terrified  to  receive  a  letter  from 
home.  It  was  addressed  to  "Mrs.  John  Woodville"  and  it 
was  written  by  her  mother,  with  a  long  postscript  from  her 
father.  Her  mother's  letter  was  a  labored  effort  to  pour  out 
sympathy  for  her  daughter  in  the  loss  of  a  husband  who, 
she  knew,  had  never  lived  and  could  not  die.  Her  expres 
sions  of  horror  a,t  his  demise  were  written  for  the  sake  of 
her  husband,  but  she  was  never  meant  for  a  dramatic  author 
and  Mem  could  feel  the  artificiality  of  her  language.  But  her 
father  was  completely  deceived  and  mourned  sincerely. 
His  postscript  was  all  pity  and  loving  sorrow ;  he  told  of  his 
prayers  for  her  strength  to  bear  her  cross  and  pleaded  with 
her  to  be  brave.  He  said  that  he  had  prayed  for  her  in 
church  and  the  congregation  sent  her  loving  messages. 

Mem  could  see  him  on  his  knees  imploring  Heaven,  pacing 
his  room  with  the  tread  she  had  heard  so  much  in  her  child 
hood,  and  stretching  his  clasped  hands  across  the  pulpit 
Bible  as  he  solicited  mercy  of  Heaven. 

Remorse  came  upon  her  again  with  the  suffocating  fury  of 
the  sandstorm.  She  felt  that  she  could  never  face  her  father 
or  her  village  again.  Now  that  her  accident  had  annulled 
her  excuse  for  being  here,  her  conscience  forbade  her  to  go 
home  again. 

Now  she  felt  an  exile  indeed,  and  an  unutterable  loneli 
ness,  without  her  lover,  her  child,  her  own  people,  or  even 
the  familiar  scenes  that  might  have  given  her  inarticulate 
consolation.  The  old  trees  about  the  old  house  would  have 
waved  their  arms  above  her,  and  murmured  mysterious 
broodings  over  the  mystery  of  despair.  The  very  trees  here 
were  foreigners. 

On  an  impulse  she  wrote  a  long  letter  to  her  mother, 
inclosed  it  in  an  unsealed  envelope,  and  inclosed  that  in  a 
sealed  envelope  addressed  to  Doctor  Bretherick.  After  the 


160  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

letter  was  mailed  she  wished  she  had  never  sent  it.  It  could 
only  carry  dismay  into  her  lonely  mother's  soul.  But  it 
was  as  impossible  to  recall  as  a  scream  shot  into  the  air. 
She  imagined  all  consequences  but  the  one  that  came  about. 

The  last  of  her  money  went  to  pay  the  doctor's  bill,  and 
she  was  a  sick  pauper.  She  resumed  her  menial  work  grad 
ually  as  her  strength  returned,  but  her  distaste  for  it  grew 
to  loathing.  The  Reddicks,  her  employers,  were  kind  to 
her,  but  they  were  master  and  mistress,  and  their  own  lives 
were  hard. 

She  was  weak  and  woebegone,  at  the  bottom  of  the  cliff 
of  life.  She  had  never  climbed  very  far,  but  she  had  fallen 
far  enough  to  give  both  soul  and  body  an  almost  fatal 
shock. 

She  was  ashamed  of  her  past,  and  her  future  was  as  dismal 
as  the  desert  and  as  full  of  cactus.  She  was  a  drudge  in  a 
poor  family  in  a  scorched  settlement  abandoned  by  all  that 
could  get  away. 

The  only  inferiors  she  could  see  were  a  young  widow 
named  Dack  and  her  five-year-old  boy,  Terry.  Mrs.  Dack 
took  in  washing.  During  the  winter  she  was  overworked; 
during  the  summer  she  was  undernourished. 

She  did  the  heaviest  laundry  for  the  Reddicks,  and  when 
she  called  for  it  she  usually  brought  her  boy  along  for  lack 
of  some  one  to  leave  him  with.  The  child  had  the  infantile 
genius  for  improving  the  world  by  imagination,  and  made 
a  brilliant  adventure  of  the  errand.  He  owned  a  rickety 
express  wagon  left  behind  by  some  visitor  child;  and  it 
gave  Terry  all  the  uplift  of  a  fiery  chariot.  His  mother 
would  set  the  bundle  of  wash  in  the  wagonette,  and  imme 
diately  it  became  a  magnificent  truck,  an  automobile,  or 
an  airship,  and  the  boy  a  team  of  horses,  a  motor,  or  a  winged 
aviator,  as  his  whim  pleased. 

His  mother  caught  a  little  cheer  from  Terry's  inexhaustible 
rapture,  and  Mem,  seeing  them  move  along  the  road  to  their 
shack,  felt  such  pity  for  them  that  she  gained  a  little  dignity 
from  the  emotion,  since  pity  is  a  downward-looking  mood. 

Her  sympathy  was  quickened,  perhaps,  by  the  frustration 
of  her  own  motherhood.  Nature  had  begun  to  prepare  her 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  161 

spirit  as  well  as  her  flesh  for  maternal  offices,  and  somewhere 
in  oblivion  was  a  half-completed  little  child  doomed  to 
perish  before  it  was  born.  That  tiny  orphan  wailed  in  the 
porches  of  Mem's  heart,  complaining  that  its  destiny,  begun 
in  romantic  shame,  was  ended  in  unromantic  catastrophe. 
Famished  of  love,  Mem  fed  upon  the  widow's  boy. 

It  hurt  Mem  to  see  how  sorry  a  future  Terry  Dack  could 
expect.  The  children  of  the  Indians  were  less  unlucky, 
because,  like  the  children  of  negroes,  they  entered  a  world 
that  made  them  no  promises. 

But  every  American  white  child  has  a  chance  at  wealth 
and  the  Presidency  of  the  United  States  as  his  inalienable 
birthright.  Yet  Terry  Dack  began  with  no  inheritance  but 
handicaps. 

He  would  have  no  opportunity  in  Palm  Springs  for  any 
thing  but  the  humblest  future.  He  would  grow  up  to  a  few 
scraps  of  public-school  education.  His  father  was  already 
dead  and  his  mother  only  half  alive.  She  had  been  a  pretty 
thing  once,  and  she  loved  to  tell  Mem  of  her  life  on  a  ranch 
near  Whitewater.  As  a  little  girl  she  had  owned  her  own 
horse  and  ridden  it.  As  a  young  "sage  hen"  she  had  been  the 
belle  of  ranch  picnics  and  parties.  She  had  married  a  glo 
rious  young  cattleman,  whose  father  went  broke  because  his 
herd  of  cattle  was  smothered  in  a  sandstorm.  The  son 
had  soon  after  been  torn  to  pieces  by  the  teeth  of  a  vicious 
horse  he  had  tried  to  break  to  the  saddle. 

Then  all  the  joy  and  velocity  had  gone  out  of  Mrs.  Back's 
life  and  she  had  become  the  bent  slave  of  a  washboard,  her 
arms  forever  elbow  deep  in  suds. 

The  boy  Terry  was  of  the  Ariel  breed.  His  fancy  girdled 
the  earth  in  forty  minutes.  The  world  was  a  stage  to  him; 
an  old  boot  as  effective  as  Cinderella's  glass  slipper;  the 
clothesline  was  a  private  telephone  wire. 

He  mimicked  birds  and  animals  and  often  covered  his 
mother  with  terror  and  amused  chagrin  by  imitating  her 
clients  with  uncanny  skill. 

He  had  an  eye  for  mannerisms  of  walk  or  posture.  His 
vision  owned  a  photographic  detail,  his  ear  a  phonographic 
skill  for  record  and  repetition. 


i62  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

Ignorant  and  young  as  he  was,  he  could  merely  sketch  the 
emphatic  features  of  the  people  he  cartooned,  but  in  the 
outline  there  was  always  a  likeness  that  made  his  mother  or 
Mem  cry  out  the  name  of  the  subject  at  once.  Terry  would 
usually  preface  his  performance  with  a: 

"Looky,  mamma!  This  is  the  way  old  Miz  Reddick 
walks.  This  is  the  way  you  do,  mamma.  This  is  what  the 
old  Indian  squaw  does  when  she  weaves  baskets  with  her 
hands  and  uses  her  feet  to  work  the  rope  that  scares  the  birds 
from  the  fig  trees.  This  is  the  way,  mamma,  you  wash 
clo'es  and  wring  'em  and  hang  'em  up  to  dry." 

Sometimes  his  mimicry  was  terrifying.  He  would  repeat 
things  he  had  overheard  in  the  street  from  careless  men; 
he  would  imitate  some  deviltry  he  had  learned  from  an 
Indian  or  Mexican  or  American  boy  or  girl,  or  from  the 
little  devil  that  curls  and  fattens  in  every  child's  own  heart, 
as  the  worm  in  the  apple. 

His  mother  and  Mem  would  look  at  each  other  in  the  dis 
may  that  comes  to  grown-ups  when  they  see  the  ignorance 
of  babyhood  vanishing  like  down  from  a  peach.  They  were 
afraid  of  what  life  in  their  wicked  little  world  would  do  to 
their  little  idol. 

Terry  would  weep  with  vexation  at  an  inattentive  audi 
ence  or  at  his  inability  to  express  what  bubbled  inside  his 
little  kettle  of  a  chest.  He  would  weep  when  angered,  but 
at  no  other  time.  Pain,  grief,  disappointment,  terror,  loneli 
ness  would  bring  no  tears,  no  sobs. 

Once  the  child  caught  cold — in  all  that  heat! — and  Mem 
sat  by  his  bedside  through  several  smothering  nights,  while 
the  back-broken  mother  slept.  Mem,  all  alone  in  her  vigil, 
found  that  imagination  was  good  company.  She  con 
structed  little  plays.  She  pretended  that  Terry  was  her  own 
baby;  and,  like  him,  she  enriched  a  sordid  existence  with 
the  rich  tapestries  of  pretense.  She  had  been  forced  to  be 
a  play  actress  for  so  long  that  the  ordeal  had  become  a 
pleasant  habit,  a  necessity. 

She  exercised  her  acquired  skill  in  making  up  little  dramas 
to  while  away  the  tedium  of  the  long  nights  and  to  keep  the 
wakeful  child's  mind  from  his  cough. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  163 

Among  all  the  rich  nights  of  human  experience,  from  the 
perfect  night  that  Socrates  praised,  the  more  than  royally 
luxurious  night  of  dreamless  sleep,  to  the  glittering  revelries 
of  a  Trimalchian  banquet,  no  nights  are  more  precious  than 
those  somber  hours  a  mother  spends  at  the  bedside  of  a 
sick  child. 

It  was  during  this  long  heartache  that  Mem  received  the 
second  letter  that  found  her  in  Palm  Springs.  This  was  from 
Leva  Lemaire,  saying  that  she  had  just  seen  in  an  old  paper 
a  paragraph  describing  Mrs.  Woodville's  fall  from  the  moun 
tain  and  her  miraculous  escape  from  death.  Leva  expressed 
the  utmost  sympathy  and  prayed  that  her  beauty  had  not 
been  marred.  She  added : 

"But  if  it  has,  you  can  still  find  something  to  do  in  the 
movies.  I've  given  up  trying  to  be  an  actress  and  taken  a 
position  in  the  laboratory  projection  room,  correcting  the 
films.  It's  cool  and  dark  and  interesting,  and  far  better 
than  that  miserable  oven.  I  think  I  can  get  you  a  place, 
if  you'll  come  up.  Los  Angeles  is  the  only  town  in  the  world 
that's  alive  these  days,  and  there's  no  excuse  for  a  woman  of 
your  education  and  charm  wasting  her  sweetness  on  the 
desert  air.  Do  come!  I've  sent  my  three  children  out  to 
their  uncle's  ranch.  You  could  live  here  with  me  and  my 
friends." 

The  thought  of  working  in  the  dark  and  the  cool  was  a 
hint  of  Paradise  to  Mem,  but  she  would  not  leave  Terry 
Dack  while  he  was  ill. 

Early  one  evening  she  went  to  the  drug  store  to  fill  a 
prescription,  and  found  a  stranger  there  sprawled  across  a 
showcase,  talking. 

His  voice  startled  her,  though  it  was  so  slow  and  lazy 
that  the  druggist  found  it  almost  a  soporific. 

"I  been  out  on  the  old  Picacho  mountain  pros'-speck- 
tin'.  I  went  over  it  once  with  an  old  pardner  o'  mine — 
name  of — well,  I  always  called  him  Woodhead.  He  went 
batty  on  me  'count  of  a  water  hole  not  havin'  no  water 
into  it." 

Mem  stood  for  a  moment,  petrified,  all  but  her  heart, 
which  was  scurrying  like  an  alarm  bell  in  a  steeple. 


i64  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

This  was  the  man  Bodlin  she  had  talked  to  in  Yuma! 
She  had  told  him  that  her  husband  was  alive  and  that  she 
was  going  into  the  desert  with  him. 

He  would  recognize  her  the  moment  he  saw  her.  He 
would  ask  about  the  husband  he  had  so  frankly  envied.  All 
her  duplicity  would  be  revealed.  She  would  probably  be 
stoned  out  of  the  village. 


CHAPTER  XXV 

HER  chief  dismay  was  her  inability  to  get  rid  of  the 
lie  she  had  begun.  She  found  it  always  ahead  of 
and  about  her  with  new  demands;  always  behind  her  with 
new  reminders. 

She  stole  out  of  the  drug  store  with  the  prescription  un 
filled  and,  hastening  down  the  street,  asked  a  young  Indian 
girl  who  came  along  to  finish  her  errand  for  her.  She  waited 
in  the  shelter  of  a  fat  palm  tree,  ready  to  take  flight  if  the 
Yuma  man  should  come  out  and  follow  her. 

But  he  was  evidently  still  telling  the  weary  druggist  his 
unsolicited  experiences,  for,  after  a  time,  the  Indian  girl 
returned,  bringing  the  medicine  and  explaining  that  her 
delay  was  due  to  the  much  palaver  of  a  man  who  would  not 
stop  talking. 

On  the  way  back  to  the  Dack  cottage  Mem  thought  fast. 
She  had  hidden  herself  in  a  tiny  hamlet,  the  nearest  thing  to 
solitude.  She  had  hidden  herself  in  vain.  The  only  other 
hope  was  to  seek  concealment  in  a  crowd,  as  Tom  Holby 
had  suggested. 

And  now  coercion  was  added  to  the  allurements  of  Los 
Angeles.  She  told  Mrs.  Dack  and  Mrs.  Reddick  that  she 
had  received  a  call  to  go  to  Los  Angeles  at  once. 

Mrs.  Reddick  protested  and  pleaded  with  all  the  hospi 
tality  that  is  bestowed  on  a  good  servant  where  servants 
of  any  sort  are  hard  to  get  and  keep.  Mrs.  Dack  could  only 
regret  her  departure,  and  her  meek  desolation  of  mien 
almost  overcame  Mem's  resolution.  The  boy  Terry  was 
out  of  danger,  but  his  arms  around  Mem's  neck  were  withes 
she  could  hardly  break.  The  soft  hands,  the  dewy  cheeks, 
the  lonely  eyes  of  the  child  were  fetters  cruelly  tyrannous. 

The  next  morning  Mem  lugged  her  old  suitcase  to  the 
starting  point  of  the  auto  stage.  It  carried  her  and  a  few 


i66  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

other  passengers  across  a  bad-lands,  pallid  as  a  convict's 
cheek  and  with  the  same  unshaven  look. 

At  Whitewater  she  caught  a  train  that  sped  her  gradu 
ally  into  the  vales  of  plenty,  through  leagues  of  citrus  groves 
in  flower  and  in  fruit  at  once. 

Seeing  orange  blossoms  abloom  in  leagues,  she  blushed  to 
think  that  she  had  never  worn  them.  She  marveled  at  the 
alleys  of  green,  polka-dotted  with  golden  oranges,  with 
lemons  and  grapefruit  hanging  like  gifts  in  tinseled  Christ 
mas  trees.  Long  reaches  of  walnut  groves  went  by  in  wheel 
spokes.  The  walnuts  made  the  neatest  and  shapeliest  of 
orchards.  There  were  olives,  almonds — roses  blowing  in 
red  miles  along  the  country  roads.  She  was  coming  up  into 
Eden. 

And  eventually  she  reached  the  new  Babel,  which  her 
father  had  denounced  as  the  last  capital  of  paganism.  No 
city  could  be  so  wicked  as  her  father  and  she  had  thought 
Los  Angeles,  and  be  anything  else.  And  Los  Angeles  was 
everything  else. 

Scanty  as  her  resources  were,  Mem  had  to  pay  a  taxi- 
cab  to  take  her  to  Leva's  home.  It  was  the  first  taxicab 
she  had  ever  ridden  in,  and  she  was  hysterical  with  fear  as 
it  shot  and  spun  through  streets  so  thick  with  traffic  and 
so  wild  that  this  city's  record  of  accidents  had  achieved 
supremacy  in  the  world. 

The  driver  mauled  his  gears  so  recklessly  that  the  cab 
was  incessantly  snarling  and  spitting,  a  very  beast  of  prey. 
Yet  Mem  was  almost  more  afraid  of  the  taximeter,  as  she 
watched  it  adding  dimes  to  her  fare  at  a  spendthrift  rate. 
She  was  likely  to  be  destroyed  by  bankruptcy  if  not  by 
collision. 

The  street  slid  through  a  long,  long  tunnel  and  then 
swooped  up  and  away  to  Sunset  Boulevard  (she  loved 
the  name) ,  then  gradually  into  a  domain  of  tiny  houses  with 
large  gardens,  each  of  a  luxuriance  that  struck  Mem  as 
almost  fantastic.  All  of  these  people  must  be  grand  viziers 
the  way  they  surrounded  themselves  with  tropical  splendors. 

The  Spanish  names  of  many  of  the  streets  made  litera 
ture  to  her  eye  and  she  was  dazed  by  the  number  of  them. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  167 

She  thought  that  Los  Angeles  must  have  extended  its  limits 
almost  to  San  Francisco.  San  Franciscans  often  made  the 
same  accusation. 

Suddenly  the  car  swerved  to  the  right  and  scooted  up  a 
little  avenue  of  low  houses,  not  white  only,  but  pink  or 
mauve  or  yellow,  with  roofs  of  varicolored  tile  and  awnings 
of  gaudy  stripe. 

In  a  city  so  widespread,  and  made  up  of  so  many  small 
houses  so  far  apart  that,  when  the  man  was  at  his  work  and 
the  wife  in  the  kitchen  or  shopping,  there  was  nobody 
visible,  she  had  the  impression  of  Los  Angeles  that  Arthur 
Somers  Roche  expressed — "a  million  white  houses  and  not 
a  soul  going  in  or  coming  out  of  one  of  them!" 

The  cab  jolted  to  a  stop  before  a  tiny  palace  of  four  or 
five  rooms.  Mem  got  down,  paid  the  pirate  her  ransom,  and 
toted  her  suitcase  up  to  the  quaint  little  door. 

This  was  Leva's  home!  She  had  a  palm  tree,  a  pepper 
tree,  a  few  truculent  cactuses,  grass,  and  a  fountain.  Along 
the  walk  stood  a  row  of  palms,  their  trunks  studded  or 
lapped  in  many  facets  where  leaf  stalks  had  been  cut  off. 
A  gorgeous  vine  of  bougainvillea  was  flung  up  over  the  cor 
nice  with  the  effect  of  a  vast  carnival  shawl. 

Leva  was  not  at  home.  A  servant  who  opened  the  door 
said  that  "she  would  not  git  back  from  the  stoodio  befo' 
six  or  happast." 

Mem  asked  permission  to  wait,  knowing  nowhere  else  to 
turn ;  she  studied  the  bright  rooms  as  if  they  were  chambers 
in  fairyland.  She  could  hardly  comprehend  the  patio,  and 
the  walls  of  concrete  (she  did  not  realize  that  she  could 
almost  have  poked  her  thumb  through  them),  the  garden 
built  into  the  house,  the  frail  and  many-tinted  furniture, 
the  photographs  of  famous  paintings  that  she  had  never 
heard  of.  The  whole  spirit  of  the  place  was  foreign  to  Mem. 
It  looked  genie-built. 

The  servant  was  glad  to  relieve  her  loneliness  with  chatter. 
She  explained  that  Miss  Lemaire  lived  there  with  three  other 
ladies,  all  of  them  in  the  movies,  and  none  of  them  getting 
their  pictures  took. 

They  lived  here  with  no  more  thought  of  chaperonage 


i68  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

than  a  crowd  of  bachelors.  Mem's  greatest  shock  was  the 
abrupt  arrival  in  a  world  where  the  enjoyment  of  life  was 
made  its  chief  business.  She  had  been  brought  up  to  believe 
in  duty  first — in  self-denial,  abstention,  modesty,  demurity, 
simplicity,  meekness,  prayer,  remorse.  Here  people  wor 
shiped  the  sun,  flowers,  dancing,  speed,  hilarity,  laughter, 
and  love. 

They  worked  hard,  but  at  the  manufacture  of  pretty 
things,  of  stories,  pictures,  paintings,  music.  To  her  there 
was  an  inconceivable  recklessness  of  consequence.  They 
thought  no  more  of  respectable  appearance  than  South  Sea 
Islanders. 

Yet  they  seemed  to  be  as  happy  as  they  tried  to  be.  They 
had  their  disappointments,  jealousies,  scandals,  gossips, 
griefs,  and  shames,  but  so  had  the  gray  village  people  she 
had  left.  These  Utopians  had  no  winter  in  their  climate 
or  in  their  souls — only  a  little  rainy  season,  a  bit  of  chill. 

When  Leva  and  her  friends  came  in  at  dinner  time  they 
came  like  young  business  men  home  from  offices,  tired  of 
shop,  yet  full  of  its  talk;  eager  for  amusement,  knowing  no 
law  except  their  own  self-respect  for  health  or  reputation  or 
efficiency.  The  first  one  in  set  a  victrola  to  playing  a  jazz 
tune  before  she  noticed  Mem.  The  second  one  in  joined 
the  first  in  a  dance.  They  quarreled  over  a  new  step  with 
laughing  violence. 

Mem  was  aghast  at  their  contempt  for  conventions. 
They  despised  the  Puritans  who  abhorred  them.  They 
snapped  their  fingers  at  appearances  and  regarded  caution 
not  as  an  evidence  of  decency,  but  as  a  proof  of  hypocrisy. 

They  had  in  their  time  known  all  of  Mem's  compunctions, 
but  had  abandoned  them  one  by  one  as  a  soldier  throws  off 
all  baggage  that  hampers  the  freedom  and  range  of  his 
march;  as  a  swimmer  in  strong  currents  casts  away  every 
thing  that  weighs,  including  clothes.  She  would  learn  that 
many  of  those  who  loved  to  break  the  rules  of  outward 
propriety  were  solid  as  white  marble  in  their  standards. 
She  had  already  learned  at  home  that  many  of  the  most 
spotless  exteriors  are  only  whited  sepulchers. 

She  would  conform  herself  with  trepidation  at  first  and 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  169 

with  much  backsliding  into  respectability  as  she  understood 
it.  But  she  would  soon  embrace  the  new  paganism  with 
desperation  and  finally  with  gayety,  adapting  herself  like 
a  beach  comber  to  the  customs  of  a  tribe  of  self-supporting 
women  who  compromised  themselves  so  freely  that  the 
critic  gave  them  up  as  hopeless.  One  does  not  fret  much 
over  the  ^conventionalities  of  gypsies. 

At  first  she  supposed  that  all  Los  Angeles  was  Hollywood. 
But  she  would  learn  that  to  a  large  portion  of  the  city's 
population  the  word  "Hollywood"  was  a  synonym  for 
riotous  outlawry,  a  plague  spot,  a  kind  of  spendthrift  slums. 
And  in  Hollywood  itself  she  would  find  a  large,  old-fashioned 
village  element  dazed  by  its  gypsies.  Furthermore,  the  city, 
which  her  father  had  damned  with  such  wholesale  horror, 
was  nine-tenths  composed  of  mid- Westerners  like  himself, 
people  who  had  brought  their  churches  and  churchliness 
with  them.  There  were  hundreds  of  thousands  of  lowans, 
Missourians,  Kansans  there;  and  they  held  picnics  con 
stantly — enormous  reunions  which  differed  from  the  camp 
meetings  and  barbecues  of  the  mid-West  only  in  the  fact 
that  the  groves  were  not  of  maple  and  oak  and  hickory, 
but  of  eucalyptus  and  palm  and  pepper. 

Whether  Mem  had  come  to  her  ruination  or  her  redemp 
tion,  she  had  come  to  a  new  world.  Before  she  learned  how 
freely,  with  what  masculine  franchise,  these  women  con 
ducted  their  lives,  before  she  could  recoil  from  such  perilous 
associations,  she  was  entrapped  in  their  cordiality,  their 
vivacity,  their  lavish  kindliness. 

Leva,  the  third  one  home,  welcomed  Mem  as  if  she  were 
a  returned  prodigal  sister  instead  of  a  passing  acquaintance 
met  in  the  desert.  She  would  listen  to  nothing  but  the 
unpacking  of  the  suitcase  and  the  acceptance  of  a  little  bed 
covered  with  a  gaudy  Navajo  blanket.  There  were  flowers 
at  Mem's  plate  in  a  lavish  heap.  And  a  big  basket  of  fruit 
was  set  in  her  room.  Calif ornians  are  prompt  and  frequent 
with  gifts  of  flowers. 

The  other  women  came  in  variously.  One  walked.  One 
drove  her  own  car  up  into  a  garage  just  a  little  bigger  than 
the  car.  One  was  set  down  by  a  big  studio  touring  car  that 
12 


iyo  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

delivered  its  passengers  of  nights  and  gathered  them  up 
again  of  mornings,  for  Los  Angeles  is  a  city  of  ^  malificent 
distances.  Every  place  is  a  Sabbath-day's  journey  from 
every  place  else.  And  there  is  no  Sabbath — at  least  no 
legal  Sabbath.  Yet  the  people  seemed  to  be  extraordinarily 
good  and  kindly.  They  seemed  to  get  the  sun  into  their 
lives.  Their  hearts  felt  as  big  and  golden  and  juicy  as  their 
own  oranges.  Even  the  lemons  had  a  sweeter  acridity  than 
at  home. 

At  home  " California  fruit"  had  been  a  byword  for  big 
ness,  high  color,  and  insipidity  of  taste,  something  a  little 
better  than  Dead  Sea  fruit.  The  smaller,  plainer  native 
apples,  pears,  and  peaches  had  possessed  a  better  flavor. 

But  California  fruit  had  reached  Calverly  after  a  long, 
dark  journey,  and  it  was  eaten  in  a  foreign  air.  Out  here, 
however,  where  the  oranges  could  be  lifted  warm  from  the 
tree,  the  figs  sliced  fresh  for  breakfast,  the  peaches  stripped 
of  their  downy  silk  while  their  wine  was  new,  there  was  no 
lapse  from  the  joyous  promise  of  their  advertisement. 

If  the  sunlight  was  of  a  gold  refined  and  somehow  enriched, 
the  shadow  was  also  of  a  deeper  cool.  Just  inside  its  edge 
the  sun  was  walled  out.  The  first  builders  had  not  known 
this.  They  had  set  above  their  houses  the  roofs  of  wintry 
climates,  and  one  might  still  see  in  older  Los  Angeles  obsolete 
homes  whose  slanting  shingles  were  excellently  arranged  to 
let  the  snow  slide  off.  Since  there  was  no  snow  to  slide, 
they  served  as  furnaces  for  the  hot  sun. 

Next  came  the  low  roof  with  the  wide,  flat  eaves,  casting 
a  heavy  shade  about  the  windows.  But  this  made  the 
houses  chilly,  and  the  new  school  brought  the  tiles  just  to 
the  brim  of  the  walls ;  and  these  walls  were  not  often  glaring 
white  as  before,  but  brown,  dove  gray,  salmon,  shrimp, 
olive. 

Where  the  shadows  lay  along  the  lawns  or  the  walks 
they  were  of  unusual  design,  not  dapplings  of  rounded  leaves 
as  in  the  mid-West,  but  the  long  scissored  slashes  of  palm 
fronds,  the  thready  reeds  of  papyrus,  the  pepper's  delicate 
flounces. 

Even  in  this  Eden,  however,  there  was  distress,  anxiety. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  171 

The  hard  times  that  were  freezing  the  outer  world  were 
threatening  the  raging  prosperity  of  Los  Angeles. 

Studios  were  closing  overnight.  Supposed  millionaires 
were  departing  abruptly  in  search  of  funds  to  meet  their 
payrolls.  Stars  who  had  been  collecting  ten  thousand  dol 
lars  a  week  or  less  were  left  stranded  in  the  midst  of  unfin 
ished  pictures  and  unfinished  mortgages  and  jewelry  bills. 
The  lesser  fry  were  being  cast  ashore  in  heaps,  like  minnows 
after  a  tidal  wave's  recession. 

The  girls  at  Leva's  were  wondering  how  long  their  jobs 
would  last.  A  mere  cut  in  salary  would  be  a  welcome  mercy, 
a  respite  from  a  death  sentence. 

This  was  devastating  news  to  Mem,  for  she  had  landed  on 
this  tropical  isle  in  the  expectation  of  at  least  a  breadfruit 
tree.  Her  blanched  face  told  her  story  to  Leva,  who  held 
out  more  hope  than  she  inly  entertained. 

"  Never  say  die,  Mrs.  Woodville,"  she  said.  "There's  always 
a  chance.  The  companies  are  turning  off  their  oldest,  most 
experienced  people  in  droves,  but  every  now  and  then  they 
take  in  a  newcomer.  I'll  speak  to  the  laboratory  chief. 
Anyway,  your  board  and  lodging  won't  cost  you  anything 
as  long  as  we've  got  either  here,  eh,  girls?" 

The  girls  agreed.  Their  adventurous  spirit  included  a 
reckless  hospitality  and  they  put  off  care  till  to-morrow  in 
the  hope  that  it  would  never  come. 

After  the  dinner  the  victrola  was  set  whirring  again  and 
Mem  was  invited  to  forget  her  troubles  in  a  fox-trot. 

She  gasped  at  this.  She  had  never  learned  even  a  lamb- 
trot.  Her  father's  church  did  not  permit  dancing,  and, 
while  it  overlooked  the  sin  in  certain  of  its  parishioners, 
there  would  have  been  scandal  indeed  if  the  parson's  daughter 
had  ever  lifted  her  foot  in  aught  save  solemnity. 

But  Mem  was  not  allowed  to  explain.  She  was  dragged 
from  her  chair  and  forced  to  copy  the  steps  set  before  her. 
It  would  have  been  impossibly  priggish  and  insulting  for 
her  to  plead  religious  scruples,  and  she  put  her  best  foot 
foremost. 

The  dance  mood  was  innate  and  she  had  a  natural  grace 
of  rhythm  that  had  languished  unheeded.  The  steps  were 


i/2  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

simple,  and  their  combination  at  the  whim  of  the  dancer 
who  led. 

Mem  was  soon  whirling  about  the  room,  with  more  or  less 
awkwardness  which  only  made  for  laughter,  and  with  a  swim 
ming  intoxication  that  left  her  panting  and  dizzy,  but 
strangely,  foolishly  happy. 

She  had  learned  a  new  alphabet  of  expression.  She  mis 
spelled  the  words  and  jumbled  the  syntax,  but  she  was 
getting  along  somehow  on  a  new  planet. 

When  three  or  four  men  drove  up  in  a  car  and  invaded 
the  house  with  invitations  to  a  dance  at  the  Hollywood 
Hotel,  Mem  declined,  of  course.  Her  refusal  was  ignored 
as  of  no  importance. 

"It's  Thursday  night,"  said  Leva,  "and  it's  our  religious 
duty  to  show  up  at  the  Hollywood.  Everybody's  there. 
You  might  meet  somebody  who'd  give  you  a  job." 

Mem  begged  to  be  excused.  She  could  not  dance  and  she 
was  very  tired. 

"That's  when  you're  at  your  best,"  cried  Leva,  who  was 
an  entirely  other  woman  from  the  shrouded  Arabian  that 
Mem  had  met  at  Palm  Springs. 

While  Mem  protested  Leva  motioned  one  of  the  men,  a 
young  actor,  to  make  her  dance. 

In  spite  of  her  struggles  she  was  snatched  from  her  chair 
into  the  arms  of  this  faun  whose  manly  beauty  was  his 
stock  in  trade.  It  was  the  first  time  any  man  except  her 
father  and  her  brothers  had  embraced  Mem  since  Elwood 
Farnaby  had  thrilled  her  with  his  love.  She  did  not  count 
the  brief  duel  with  Tom  Holby  in  Palm  Canon,  since  he  had 
made  no  effort  to  overwhelm  her  resistance. 

But  this  laughing  satyr,  Mr.  Creighton,  held  her  tight 
and  compelled  her  to  dance. 

Giddy  with  the  whirl  and  sullen  with  the  outrage,  Mem's 
anger  blazed  into  open  disgust.  Creighton  said  he  was  hor 
ribly  sorry  and  only  meant  it  in  fun,  and  by  his  abject 
contrition  made  Mem  ashamed  of  herself.  She  did  not 
know  what  to  do  or  say. 

This  was  her  first  experience  of  the  confusion  that  comes 
from  being  too  respectable  on  a  holiday.  To  escape  from 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  173 

the  scene  of  her  kill-joy  boorishness  (as  it  looked  to  her 
now)  she  went  out  into  the  moonlit  patio.  The  moon 
seemed  to  make  life  simpler.  It  has  a  way  of  blotting  the 
material  details  with  dumb  shadow  and  spreading  a  love 
light  over  dreamy  surfaces. 

From  a  house  somewhere  near  and  drowned  in  foliage  came 
a  music  of  guitar  and  ukulele  and  young  voices. 

An  automobile  went  by,  trailing  laughter  in  a  glittering 
scarf.  Over  her  head  a  palm  tree  waved  an  aromatic  fan, 
as  over  a  daughter  of  Pharaoh.  Along  the  northern  sky  the 
mountains  were  aligned,  built  of  some  soft-tinted  cloudiness 
as  if  they  were  a  wall  decreed  between  this  Xanadu  of  all 
delights  and  the  harsh,  respectable  realms  of  the  East,  a 
barrier  between  the  woeful  lands  of  shagbark  and  mock 
orange  and  this  garden  of  almond  trees  and  roses. 

In  a  radiance  so  amorous  that  it  seemed  almost  to  coo, 
Mem  felt  that  the  great  needs  of  her  soul  were  love,  tender 
ness,  rapture.  This  yearning  was  divine  in  this  light.  In 
the  bright  lexicon  of  the  moon  there  was  no  such  word  as 
"Don't!"  Everything  wooed  everything.  In  Mem's  down 
cast  eyes  her  bosom  was  silvered  with  the  glamour  and  gath 
ered  into  the  same  thought  that  mused  upon  wall  and  flower 
and  tree,  upon  the  deeps  of  the  sky,  and  upon  the  nearest 
vine  leaf  aquake  with  the  ecstasy  of  being  alive  at  night. 

The  air  was  imbued  with  a  luscious  fragrance  that  de 
lighted  her  nostrils  and  drew  her  eyes  to  an  orange  tree, 
almost  a  perfect  globe  in  symmetry,  and  curiously  forming 
a  little  universe  whose  support  was  lost  in  the  gloom  beneath. 
In  the  round  night  of  its  own  sky  hung  moons  exhaling  per 
fume  and  temptation. 

Like  another  Eve,  she  yielded  to  the  cosmic  urge  and  put 
her  hand  forth  to  the  tree  of  knowledge,  plucked  the  fruit 
that  was  not  hers,  and  made  it  hers. 

She  did  not  peel  the  cloth  of  gold  and  divide  the  pulp, 
but,  as  she  had  seen  these  Calif ornians  do,  buried  her  teeth 
in  the  ruddy  flesh,  tore  out  a  hole,  and  drained  the  syrup. 

She  was  too  well  schooled  in  biblical  lore  not  to  think  of 
Eve.  There  was,  however,  no  Adam  for  her  to  involve  in  her 
fall;  so  she  took  the  whole  fruit  for  herself.  But  then, 


174  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

instead  of  feeling  shame  as  the  scales  fell  from  her  eyes, 
shame  itself  fell  from  her  and  she  laughed.  Eve  had  become 
Lilith  for  the  moment. 

She  felt  in  her  heart  that  there  was  something  wrong  here 
in  this  new  life.  But  then  there  had  been  so  much  wrong  in 
the  life  she  had  led  before.  This  was  a  city  of  peril,  but  she 
had  not  escaped  peril  at  home. 

She  breathed  deep  of  the  new  freedom.  She  cast  off  her 
past,  resolved  to  bend  her  head  and  her  back  no  longer  under 
remorse,  but  to  stand  erect,  to  run,  and  dance,  and  to  be 
beautiful  and  rich  and  famous. 

Like  Eve,  she  felt  that  the  first  necessity  of  her  new  era 
was  clothes.  If  she  had  had  any  she  would  have  called  a 
taxicab  and  dashed  away  to  the  Hollywood  Hotel.  She 
felt  that  she  could  dance  with  anybody  or  with  nobody. 
She  could  be  Salome  and  dance  herself  into  half  a  kingdom, 
dance  everybody's  head  off,  including  her  own, 

But  it  has  been  so  arranged  that  whenever  a  woman  is 
set  on  fire  with  a  high  resolution  to  do  some  glorious  thing, 
an  elbow  demon  always  brings  her  back  to  the  dust  by 
whispering,  ''You  have  nothing  fit  to  wear."  Otherwise 
the  conquest  of  the  world  would  not  have  been  left  to 
blundering,  hesitant  males. 

Mem  went  into  the  house.  The  moon  was  all  very  well  for 
beautiful  moods,  but  it  was  impracticable;  it  did  not  pro 
vide  the  wardrobe  for  the  deeds  it  inspired. 

She  went  into  the  house  like  a  prisoner  granted  a  little 
exercise  in  a  walled  yard,  then  driven  back  to  her  cell.  She 
was  awake  in  her  perplexities  when  Leva  and  her  friends 
came  home.  The  young  men  raided  the  ice  box,  then  went 
their  way. 

Leva  was  so  drowsy  that  she  could  hardly  get  her  hair 
down,  but  she  sat  on  the  edge  of  Mem's  bed  and  discussed 
the  future. 

Leva  advised  new  duds  by  all  means,  and  offered  to  have 
them  charged  to  her  own  account  until  Mem  could  find  a 
job  and  begin  to  pay.  It  was  harrowing  to  Mem  to  think 
that  she  must  take  on  a  burden  of  large  debt  before  she 
could  hope  for  small  wages.  But  the  need  was  imperative. 


SOULS    FOR   SALE  175 

The  next  morning  Mem  acquired  on  tick  the  brief  trous 
seau  of  a  little  business  bride.  Then  she  went  to  the  studio 
with  Leva  and  was  assigned  without  delay  to  the  laboratory 
projection  room  at  twenty-five  dollars  a  week.  A  hundred 
pretty  actresses  got  no  jobs  at  all,  for  they  were  seeking 
glory  and  wealth. 

The  size  of  the  studio  astounded  Mem.  It  was  a  vast 
factory.  This  company's  assets  were  thirteen  million  dol 
lars;  its  last  year's  gross  income  eight  millions.  In  a  score 
of  years  a  toy  unknown  before  had  become  the  fifth  largest 
industry  in  the  world,  a  mammoth  target  for  every  sort  of 
critic. 

And  now  Mem  had  entered  the  machine  shop,  if  not  the 
art. 


CHAPTER  XXVI 

AJL  day  she  sat  in  a  dark  room  and  ran  a  little  projecting 
machine  that  poured  forth  moving  pictures  before  her 
on  a  little  private  screen.  She  must  watch  out  for  typo 
graphical  errors,  a  "to"  for  a  "too,"  a  slip  of  grammar,  a 
mistake  in  an  actor's  or  a  character's  name.  Her  common- 
school  education  was  good  enough  for  this,  though  it  was  by 
no  means  so  marvelous  as  Leva  had  told  her  employers  it 
was. 

Later  Mem  was  permitted  to  study  the  films  for  blemishes, 
scratches,  dust  specks,  bad  printing,  bad  tinting,  bad  assem 
bly,  bad  any  one  of  a  score  of  things. 

There  were  five  other  young  women  besides  Leva  engaged 
at  the  same  task,  each  with  her  little  projection  machine 
and  her  little  screen  and  her  little  picture  racing  ahead  of 
her  past  the  continual  night  of  the  laboratory.  At  one  end 
of  the  projection  room  was  a  larger  screen  for  the  laboratory 
chief  (a  learned  scientist)  and  his  assistants  and  occasional 
directors  who  came  with  problems  of  photography  requiring 
immediate  solution. 

The  conversation  was  in  a  foreign  language  to  Mem,  but 
the  jargon  grew  gradually  familiar  and  she  kept  an  eager 
ear  alert  for  information.  She  decided  to  master  the  trade 
in  every  detail. 

It  was  fascinating  at  first — a  strange  and  fairy  business. 

Like  a  chorus  of  girls  at  spinning  wheels  these  maids  sat 
and  unrolled  from  the  magic  distaff  romance  unending  and 
of  infinite  variety. 

Mem  was  supposed  to  keep  her  mind  on  her  own  screen, 
but  it  was  impossible  not  to  glance  at  the  other  pictures. 
Now  there  was  a  glittering  flood  of  waters  roaring  almost 
audibly  through  a  canon,  and  in  them  a  spun  and  tormented 
canoe  that  finally  flung  into  the  waves  a  fugitive  woman 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  177 

and  cast  her  on  the  rocks.  Some  one  told  her  that  so  great 
an  actress  as  Mary  Alden  had  spent  thirty  minutes  in  those 
icy  waters  while  they  photographed  the  scene.  This  went 
by  again  and  again  in  different  "takes"  by  different  cameras, 
as  if  Miss  Alden  had  been  killed  and  brought  to  life  again 
repeatedly  to  respond  to  encores  of  death. 

Over  against  this  tremendous  rush  of  nature  there  appeared 
suddenly  a  yet  more  thrilling  cataract  of  human  passions,  a 
battle  in  a  Chinese  den,  where  frenzied  criminals,  Chinese 
and  half-castes  and  policemen,  struck  and  stabbed  and  shot 
and  broke  over  one  another's  heads  furniture  of  exquisite 
carving  or  hurtled  from  ornate  balconies  and  splintered 
embroidered  screens  and  jeweled  idols;  Lon  Chaney  leered 
and  bled  and  let  demoniac  thoughts  flicker  across  his  mask. 

Parallel  with  this  flowed  a  torrent  of  luxury,  a  reception 
in  a  home  of  wealth,  designed  by  Cedric  Gibbons,  lover  of 
arches  and  interlaced  perspectives;  beautiful  women  in 
gleaming  dresses  danced  or  listened  to  love  stories  or  let 
tears  drip  like  diamonds  upon  their  fans  of  white  peacock 
feathers. 

A  vast  mountain  range  shouldered  the  clouds  aside  and 
a  posse  of  vigilantes  chased  a  pack  of  desperadoes  on  desper 
ate  horses  or  desperadoes  chased  Tom  Mix  as  a  fugitive 
hero  who  sent  his  broncho  leaping,  sliding,  galloping  down 
cliffs  and  up  ravines,  a  swallow  darting  away  from  falcons. 

In  a  close-up  of  huge  detail,  Will  Rogers's  whimsical  face 
twisted  with  cowboy  impudence  and  embarrassment  and 
pathetic  wit. 

In  another,  the  cinematographic  features  of  Helene  Chad- 
wick  exploited  her  subtlest  moods  in  a  language  that  could 
not  be  misunderstood;  or  Claude  Gillingwater's  Jovian 
brows  struggled  with  big  emotions  or  Richard  Dix's  stalwart 
humor  flourished. 

He  was  whisked  away,  and  a  low  comedian  took  his  place 
with  high  antics  of  most  ancient  glory,  the  horseplay  that 
the  new  critics  have  always  denounced  and  the  classics 
have  always  adored:  the  knock-about  assaults  on 
dignity,  the  physical  satires  on  pomposity  that  delighted 
^Eschylus  no  less  than  Aristophanes,  Cervantes,  Shake- 


178  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

speare,  Goethe,  all  the  big  men  who  were  not  afraid  of  fun 
and  understood  that  there  is  less  wisdom  in  a  strut  than  in 
a  caper.  Then  the  sensitive  beauty  of  Colleen  Moore  rolled 
by  tremulous  to  every  least  emotion  as  an  aspen  leaf. 

Before  all  these  windows  Mem  looked  into  countless 
phases  of  life  and  emotion  and  character.  It  occurred  to  her 
that  she  was  getting  a  divine  purview  of  the  world.  Life 
to  her  looked  much  what  life  must  look  like  to  God.  He 
must  see  billions  of  souls  unrolling  their  continuities  before 
him  in  all  varieties  of  grimace,  frenzy,  collapse,  appeal  for 
pity  or  laughter.  Humanity  must  dance  before  him  as 
before  her  until  each  life  was  cut  off  or  vanished  in  its  final 
fade-out 

She  wondered  more  and  more  why  the  moving  pictures 
should  have  been  greeted  with  hostility  and  contempt  or 
fear.  She  did  not  understand  that  they  wrho  teach  the  world 
a  new  language,  or  open  a  new  world,  or  bring  golden  gifts 
of  any  sort  to  the  people  are  always  crucified  at  first  by 
the  Pharisees.  Later,  their  converts  become  Pharisees  for 
new  Messiahs. 

She  was  ignorant  of  the  primeval  eternal  habit  of  the 
critic  mind  to  lash  out  at  all  that  is  alive  and  eager.  Why 
lash  the  dead?  They  cannot  feel  the  sting  of  the  whip. 

She  knew  only  that  the  moving  pictures  were  abhorrent 
to  multitudes  and  it  seemed  to  her  pitiful  that  this  should 
be  so.  All  these  actors  and  actresses  and  photographers 
were  merely  trying  to  illuminate  life,  to  pass  dull  hours 
away,  to  quicken  the  spirits  of  the  lonely  and  the  weary. 

The  artistic  beauties  of  the  pictures  made  her  inarticu 
lately  happy.  She  knew  nothing  of  painting  or  sculpture 
or  architecture.  She  loved  sunsets  and  moon  dawns  and 
light  on  leaves  and  the  textures  of  fabrics  embracing  shad 
ows  in  their  folds.  She  loved  the  war  of  gloom  and  glow. 
She  found  the  pictures  overwhelmingly  beautiful  to  her 
eyes,  kaleidoscopes  of  leaping  masses  and  lines,  symphonic 
tempests  of  shape  and  color. 

For  a  time  Mem  was  in  a  heaven  of  tumultuous  ecstasies. 
But  gradually  the  delight  turned  to  torture,  the  torture  of 
envy. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  179 

She  was  young  and  she  had  been  told  that  she  was  beau 
tiful.  She  had  realized  with  shame  and  anger  and  disgust 
at  first  that  she  seized  the  eye  and  charmed  it.  Now,  as  in 
almost  every  other  way,  she  was  so  revolutionized  that  what 
had  hitherto  seemed  to  her  odious  was  beginning  to  seem 
admirable.  What  had  been  her  evil  was  her  good  and  her 
good  her  evil. 

If  God  made  her  pretty  it  was  because  he  delighted  in 
beauty  and  wanted  it  known.  He  did  not  grow  flowers  in 
cellars.  He  was  not  afraid  to  squander  the  sunshine. 

If  the  art  of  mimicry  was  a  God-given  gift,  it  must  be 
meant  for  use.  She  had  acted  once  before  a  camera,  there 
in  the  desert.  She  had  felt  the  possession  of  an  alien  agony. 
She  had  shot  tears  from  her  eyelids.  She  had  brought  tears 
to  the  eyes  of  strangers.  She  had  tasted  the  sweet  poison 
of  vicarious  suffering.  It  was  accounted  divine  on  a  cross; 
why  diabolic  on  a  screen?  She  was  an  actress  by  divine 
intention. 

She  sat  in  a  dark  room  and  watched  other  people's  pic 
tures  flow  by.  It  seemed  wrong,  wicked,  cruel. 

Yet  she  was  educating  herself  unconsciously  in  the  com 
plex  technics  of  acting,  learning  dramatic  analysis  and 
synthesis. 

Fools  who  knew  nothing  about  acting  spoke  of  it  as  if  it 
had  no  intellectual  element.  They  thought  that  the  common- 
enough  ability  to  write  impudent  scurrilities  about  the 
brainlessness  of  actors  was  a  proof  of  brains. 

Mem  came  to  see  how  difficult  a  science,  how  bewildering 
an  art  the  mimetic  career  requires.  She  would  learn  the 
anguishes  of  self-control  and  self -compulsion  that  must  be 
undergone  when  the  actor's  soul  squeezes  itself  into  the 
mold  of  another  character.  She  could  already  see  how  many 
ways  there  were  of  thinking,  holding  hands,  of  looking  love 
or  hate,  of  kissing,  crying,  laughing,  rising  up  and  sitting 
down. 

She  was  mad  to  act. 


CHAPTER  XXVII 

AMONG  the  processions  of  types  that  marched  past 
Mem's  eyes  as  she  sat  at  her  magic  window  in  the 
projection  room — among  the  innumerable  American  types, 
good  and  bad,  rich,  poor,  foreign,  native,  rural,  urban,  the 
aliens  of  every  clime  and  age  and  costume,  the  animals  and 
the  birds,  the  plunging  horses  of  the  cowboys,  the  lions,  the 
wolves,  the  rattlesnakes,  went  many  children  in  rags  and 
tags  and  velvet  gowns. 

She  saw  Booth  Tarkington's  "Edgar"  family  and  the 
other  tiny  artists  of  the  colony;  exquisite  Lucille  Ricksen; 
the  essence  of  boyhood,  Johnny  Jones;  the  plump  Buddy 
Messenger;  the  adorable  Robert  de  Vilbiss.  She  saw  at 
the  movie  houses  the  little  master  of  comedy,  Wesley  Barry, 
with  his  skin  a  constellation  of  freckles;  and  the  all-conquer 
ing  Jackie  Coogan. 

On  the  lot  she  saw  the  children,  and  they  were  always 
happy.  The  mothers  were  with  the  little  ones.  Going  to 
work  was  going  to  play.  They  lived  an  eternal  fairy  story. 
They  did  not  have  to  wait  till  bedtime  to  coax  a  worn- 
out  fable  from  a  jaded  parent.  They  went  through  great 
adventures  in  magic-built  castles.  They  had  an  infinite 
number  of  new  toys  and  new  games,  and,  greatest  bliss  of 
all,  they  had  importance. 

Mem  was  told  that  five-year-old  Jackie  Coogan  had  made 
his  mother  a  present  of  a  big  touring  car  costing  seven 
thousand  dollars !  that  he  had  a  salary  of  seventeen  hundred 
and  fifty  dollars  a  week!  She  thought  of  little  Terry  Dack 
and  his  second-hand  express  wagon,  helping  his  mother  to 
pack  her  bundled  wash  home  to  bitter  toil.  He  had  a  dis 
mal  life  on  the  desert's  edge,  illumined  only  by  his  own 
unconquerable  fancy  and  his  dramatic  gifts.  His  was  the 
home  life  of  multitudes  of  American  children.  He  ha.d  far 


SOULS   FOR   SALE  181 

more  of  mother's  love  than  most  of  them.  Yet  the  stage 
child  and  the  movie  child  were  spoken  of  with  pity ! 

Mem  decided  that  it  was  well  worth  a  child's  while  to  ac 
cept  such  pity  as  a  rebate  on  the  fat  blessings  of  such  a  life. 

She  wrote  Terry's  mother,  urging  her  to  come  to  Los 
Angeles  without  delay ;  to  beg,  borrow,  or  steal  the  necessary 
funds;  to  seize  the  chance  to  rescue  the  divine  child  from 
poverty  and  oblivion,  and  to  earn  luxury  by  giving  the 
world  the  sunshine  of  his  irresistible  charm. 

She  had  not  meant  to  let  anyone  in  Palm  Springs  know 
where  she  was,  but  she  took  the  risk  of  embarrassment 
rather  than  risk  the  boy's  future.  Her  motherhood  had 
transplanted  itself  to  that  other  child,  and  his  welfare  was 
vital  to  her. 

As  a  final  inducement  she  promised  to  introduce  Terry 
to  the  management  of  her  own  studio.  She  permitted  the 
impression  that  she  was  a  rather  important  person  on  the 
staff. 

And  the  day  after  she  mailed  the  letter  she  lost  her  job. 

The  tide  of  hard  times  had  engulfed  the  studio  where 
she  was  engaged.  All  but  two  or  three  companies  were  laid 
off.  The  laboratory  force  was  reduced  to  a  skeleton.  She 
went  home  one  night  and  did  not  come  back. 

And  now  the  dark  room  that  had  come  to  be  a  prison  cell 
was  as  dear  a  home  as  the  shut  cage  of  a  canary  that  cannot 
get  in  again. 

She  was  homesick  for  the  many-windowed  gloom ;  for  the 
black  wet  chambers  with  the  big  vats  of  "soup"  where  the 
endless  tapes  of  minute  pictures  wTere  developed;  the  lurid 
red  rooms  where  the  printing  machines  chattered;  the 
drying  rooms  where  the  vast  mill  wheels  revolved  with  their 
cascades  of  film. 

The  gates  of  the  "lot"  were  closed  against  her  as  the 
gates  of  Eden  against  Eve. 

There  was  no  pleasure  in  lying  abed  of  mornings.  There 
was  no  comfort  in  omitting  the  stampede  to  beat  the  time 
clock. 

The  pay  day  came  around  no  more,  either.  She  had  debts 
to  absolve  for  clothes  no  longer  fresh.  She  had  to-morrow's 


i82  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

and  next  week's  hunger  to  dread.  The  girls  at  her  house 
were  equally  idle  and  their  hospitality  lost  its  warmth  for 
lack  of  fuel. 

They  tried  to  make  the  best  of  idleness.  They  wore  the 
records  to  shreds  and  danced  together  all  day  long  to  pass 
the  time  away. 

Young  men  who  had  no  money  to  spend  on  excursions 
came  to  the  house  of  evenings  and  helped  to  dance  away  the 
tedium. 

It  became  a  commonplace  for  Mem  to  jig  about  in  young 
men's  arms.  She  learned  to  dance.  She  learned  to  play  a 
little  golf,  a  little  tennis.  She  even  gained  a  bit  of  famili 
arity  with  the  saddle  at  the  home  of  an  actress  who  owned 
horses  and  had  built  a  riding  ring  on  her  estate  when  she 
was  flush,  and  was  glad  now  to  have  her  friends  exercise 
themselves  and  her  stable. 

Mem  went  also  on  her  first  beach  picnic.  If  she  did  not 
learn  to  swim,  she  learned  at  least  to  add  the  paganism  of 
the  ocean  to  the  paganism  of  the  canons,  the  deserts,  and 
the  palm-blown  plains, 

The  Pacific-coast  civilization  surpassed  all  the  other 
coasts  in  its  return  to  the  pre-figleaf  days.  On  the  leagues 
of  sand  variously  named  Coronado,  La  Jolla,  Laguna,  Re- 
dondo,  Hermosa,  Santa  Monica,  there  was  as  much  care 
free,  clothes-free  gayety  as  in  the  Marquesan  and  Tahitian 
realms  that  Frederick  O'Brien  found,  or  made,  so  Elysian 
with  his  fragrant  pen. 

The  first  day  of  Mem's  visit  to  the  shore  was  terrifying. 
As  the  automobile  in  which  she  rode  threaded  the  long  and 
narrow  lane  of  Venice,  a  woman  darted  across  the  path, 
dragging  a  child  by  the  arm.  Mem  thought  at  first  that  the 
mother  must  be  fleeing  from  a  fire  that  had  surprised  her  in 
her  tub,  and  that  in  her  confusion  she  had  put  on  her  hus 
band's  undershirt  and  nothing  else. 

But  hundreds  of  others  were  seen  hurrying  from  that 
same  fire  in  much  the  same  costume. 

The  girls  she  was  with  parked  the  car  in  a  little  blind  alley 
ending  at  the  walk  along  the  sand.  Mem  had  come  at  last 
to  "where  the  mountains  meet  the  sea." 


SOULS   FOR   SALE  183 

The  blinding  blue  desert  of  the  Pacific,  almost  as  calm  as 
the  sky  it  met  and  welded  with,  the  twin  blues  overwhelmed 
Mem  for  a  moment  with  vastitude.  Then  she  caught  sight 
of  the  margin  where  the  waves  broke  lazily  in  long  cork 
screwing  lines  of  green  fringed  with  white  froth.  Among 
the  billows  and  in  front  of  them  swarming  human  midges 
leaped,  swam,  ran,  walked,  squatted,  burrowed,  flirted, 
lunched,  nursed  babies,  slept. 

The  sand  was  abloom  with  umbrellas,  a  monstrous  poppy 
field.  Along  the  endless  walk  miles  on  miles  of  little  shops 
were  aligned,  with  piers  thrusting  out  into  the  ocean,  bridges 
that  led  nowhere  and  were  loaded  down  with  pleasure  shops. 
Giant  wheels,  insane  railroads  that  made  a  sport  of  seasick 
terrors,  every  ingenuity  for  making  happy  fools  of  the  mob 
bent  on  unbending. 

As  far  as  the  eye  could  see  along  the  vast  scythe  blade  of 
shore  thousands  seethed,  all  so  lightly  garbed  that  if  Mem 
had  met  any  one  of  them  in  Calverly  she  would  have  fainted 
or  fled.  She  was  stunned.  But  the  enormity  of  the  multi 
tude  gave  the  exposure  an  impersonal  aspect.  It  was  like 
looking  into  a  can  of  fishing  worms  wriggling  unclothed  in 
anything  but  a  light  nuptial  band  of  color. 

As  she  stood  benumbed  Leva  nudged  her  and  said,  "Hurry 
up;  we  mustn't  miss  a  minute." 

"Am  I  expected  to  go  in  there  like  that?" 

"Of  course!" 

"Not  me!    Not  to-day!    No,  thank  you!" 

She  could  not  be  persuaded.  She  hardly  consented  to  sit 
on  the  sand  and  wait.  While  she  waited  her  eyes  were 
whipped  with  such  sights  that  she  was  anassthetized  by 
shock.  Fat  mothers,  fat  fathers,  scrawny  matrons,  and 
skeletonic  elders  paraded  among  infants  and  boys  and  girls 
in  all  stages  of  growth,  and  none  of  them  was  decently 
clothed  according  to  any  standard  Mem  knew. 

Here  and  there  Apollos  and  Aphrodites  moved  in  perfec 
tion  of  design  and  rhythm,  their  beauty  and  their  grace 
appallingly  revealed.  Mem  bent  her  head,  averted  her  eyes, 
felt  sick  at  the  stomach.  But  the  coercion  of  the  throng  was 
more  potent  than  any  other  influence.  She  began  to  think 


i84  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

herself  a  ninny  to  be  the  only  one  out  of  step  with  this  army. 
She  compelled  herself  to  look  without  flinching  and,  she 
hoped,  without  curiosity. 

By  and  by  the  sanity,  the  beauty,  the  higher  morality  of 
it  began  to  convert  her  from  the  immemorial  folly  of  making 
a  virtue  out  of  a  physical  hypocrisy. 

The  world  had  come  a  long  distance  from  the  period  when 
a  law  was  passed  in  Virginia  in  1824,  making  it  a  misde 
meanor  to  take  a  bath  in  private,  except  upon  the  advice  of 
physicians,  which  advice  was  usually  against  such  a  dan 
gerous  practice. 

The  world  had  come  a  long  distance  from  the  ideal  of 
wearing  one's  graveclothes  and  one's  grave  expression  while 
still  walking  about  the  earth.  There  were  still  loud  howlers 
and  sincere  pleaders  against  the  infamy  of  letting  other 
people  see  one's  epidermis,  against  letting  mankind  know 
that  womankind  was  biped.  But  the  dear  old  ladies  and 
gentlemen  with  their  brooms  could  not  sweep  back  this 
oceanic  tide. 

Here  and  there  they  arrested  or  mobbed  some  woman  or 
man  who  took  off  an  inch  or  two  too  much  of  the  mysteri 
ously  permitted,  ever-varying  minimum.  But  millions 
bathed  in  public  and  sought  the  fountain  of  youth  not  in 
dark  forests,  but  on  the  sun-gilt  ground  where  sea  and  land 
debated  boundaries. 

By  the  time  Leva  and  her  company  came  leaping  out  to 
join  the  revel,  Mem  was  a  little  better.  Seeing  her  friends, 
whose  good  sweet  souls  she  loved,  was  a  fresh  shock,  but  she 
survived  it  and  envied  them  their  ability  to  fling  off  their 
solemnities  with  their  other  garments. 

Before  the  afternoon  had  slipped  into  twilight  she  was 
able  to  laugh  when  she  saw  them  playing  ball  with  sunburnt 
young  men  of  their  acquaintance.  When  they  gathered 
about  her  and  sat  in  a  crisscross  of  brown  and  white  legs, 
she  had  to  reconcile  herself  to  South  Sea  standards.  The 
sky  was  too  bright  to  stare  at  all  the  time.  They  ate  pea 
nuts  and  popcorn  and  introduced  her  to  that  wonderful 
meal  composed  of  a  roll  split  open  like  a  clam  and  stuffed 
with  cleft  sausage,  dill  pickle,  lettuce,  and  mustard,  a  viand 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  185 

so  irresistibly  good  that  it  lent  a  grace  to  its  shameless  name, 
"hot  dog." 

A  few  days  later  Mem  might  have  been  seen  in  a  bathing 
suit  of  popular  brevity,  substituting  a  general  coat  of  tan 
for  the  forty  blushpower  slio  had  abandoned. 

She  was  not  sure  whether  to  call  herself  a  lost  or  a  new 
found  soul,  but  she  was  sure  that  she  was  an  utter  changeling 
from  the  remorseful  girl  who  stole  shamefast  out  of  Calverly 
to  hide  herself  from  human  eyes. 

She  was  already  publishing  her  bodily  graces  to  the  world 
and  she  was  devoured  with  ambition  to  give  her  soul  also 
entire  to  the  millions.  She  wanted  to  attitudinize  her  soul 
upon  a  film  as  public  and  as  huge  as  the  sky  and  compel 
mankind  to  watch  it  and  admire. 

Mem  in  a  way  was  an  allegory  of  all  recent  womanhood. 
She  had  dwelt  in  Puritanical  respectability  as  in  a  kind  of 
mental  harem,  with  a  yashmak  on  her  demure  mind  and  a 
shapeless  black  robe  of  modesty  over  her  bundlesome  clothes. 
Her  thoughts  had  been  her  father's  to  direct  until  he  should 
guide  them  into  a  husband's  fold.  Something  had  gone 
wrong.  Her  thoughts  had  contained  black  sheep  that 
strayed  and  fell  into  the  dark  ravines. 

But  now  she  was  out  of  it  all,  joining  the  vast  hegira  of 
humanity  from  the  dark  ages  of  ritual  and  ceremonial  and 
uniform  into  the  new  era  of  all  things  good  in  their  place, 
and  concealment  of  the  truth  the  one  irretrievable  evil. 

Her  soul  and  her  body  were  her  own  now.  No,  they  had 
gone  beyond  even  that.  Her  soul  and  body  were  the  pub 
lic's.  Beauty  was  community  property.  She  was  com 
mitted  to  their  fullest  development  into  such  joyous  acrobatic 
agility  and  power  that  they  should  give  joy  and  a  delightful 
sorrow  to  the  public.  For  which  the  grateful  public  would 
pay  with  gratitude  and  fame  and  much  money. 

13 


CHAPTER  XXVIII 

IN  swimming,  dancing,  mountain  climbing,  horseback- 
climbing,  motoring,  singing,  laughing,  days  and  nights 
reeled  by.  But  gayety  as  an  ether  against  the  pangs  of 
idleness  was  a  heavy,  an  almost  nauseous,  drug.  She  looked 
back  on  her  earlier  existence  at  home  as  a  slothful  indolence 
at  best,  a  waste  of  gifts,  a  burying  of  genius  in  a  napkin 
and  the  napkin  in  the  ground  where  it  must  rot,  yet  never 
lift  a  flower  from  its  corruption.  To  be  busy,  to  achieve,  to 
build  her  soul  and  sell  it — that  was  her  new  passion.  She 
gave  up  all  thought  of  going  home  to  Calverly.  She  would 
never  be  content  with  village  life  again. 

One  day  she  loitered  through  Westlake  Park  and  watched 
the  visitors  feed  the  wild  fowl  that  grow  tame  there.  The 
man  or  child  who  had  bread  crumbs  for  largess  was  almost 
mobbed.  Overhead  the  chuckling  seagulls  made  a  living 
umbrella,  careening  and  dipping  to  hook  the  morsels  tossed 
in  air.  From  every  quarter  birds  of  various  pinion  gathered, 
swerved,  darted,  flung  backward  on  wings  that  were  both 
brake  and  motor.  About  the  feet  others  scampered  or 
stalked,  pecking,  gobbling.  On  the  nearer  ripples  ducks, 
terns,  and  geese  moved  like  little  ferryboats;  coots  scooted, 
and  swans,  black  and  white,  thrust  up  their  periscopes  from 
the  reedy  banks  where  they  moored. 

Mem  loafed  about  until  she  grew  too  weary  to  stand. 
Her  despondent  soul  drifted  as  lazily  as  the  swans,  and  felt 
almost  as  willing  to  beg  for  bread.  She  sat  down  on  a  bench 
on  the  Seventh  Street  side,  and  by  and  by  was  hailed  by  a 
sturdy  mid-Western  voice. 

"Well,  as  I  live  and  breathe!    If  it  ain't  Miss  Steddon!" 

"Why,  how  do  you  do,  Mrs.  Sturgs!" 

It  was  a  mid-aged  woman  who  had  been  a  member  of  her 
father's  church  and  had  gone  West — Mem  had  now  to  say, 
"come  West" — because  of  her  husband's  lungs. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  187 

Mem's  first  impulse  was  to  welcome  anyone  from  home. 
Her  second  was  to  fear  anyone  from  home.  But  Mrs.  Sturgs 
was  already  squeezing  her  broad  person  into  the  remaining 
space  on  the  bench. 

Her  life  in  this  Babylon  had  not  changed  her  small-town 
soul,  body,  or  prejudices. 

Mem's  wits  scurried  in  vain  to  bring  up  protecting  lies. 
Mrs.  Sturgs  was  too  full  of  her  own  opinions  and  adventures 
to  ask  any  embarrassing  questions  beyond  a  hasty  take-off 
for  her  own  biography:  "And  how's  your  father  and  your 
mother  and  your  whole  fambly?  All  well,  I  hope.  And  so 
you're  here!  Well,  well!  Well,  as  I  was  sayin'  yest'day, 
everybody  on  Dearth  gets  to  Los  Angeles  sooner  or  later. 
It's  a  nice  city,  too,  full  of  good,  honest,  plain — o'  course 
those  awful  moving  -  picture  people  have  given  the  town 
a —  But  there's  plenty  of  real  nice  folksy  folks  here;  and 
the  town  growin'  faster  than —  Well,  as  I  was  tellin'  m' 
husband  last  week,  it  takes  all  kinds  to  make  a  world 
and  the  Lord  may  have  had  some  idea  of  his  own  when 
he  made  movies;  of  course,  I  enjoy  seein'  'em.  You  just 
can't  help  enjoyin'  the  terrible —  But  the  people  that 
make  'em — well! 

"Such  stories  as  they  do  tell  about  their —  Why,  that 
Hollywood  is  just  a  plague  spot  on  the  earth!  The  gent 'man 
we  used  to  rent  from —  We  own  our  own  home  now,  or 
will  soon  when  a  few  more  installments  are —  And  the 
prices  here! — my  dear!  oh  dear!  But  he  said  that  friends 
of  his  who  had  rented  their  homes  to  movie  people —  Why, 
would  you  believe  it?  some  of  those  cowboys — one  day  on 
the  ranch,  next  day  earning  a  thousand  dollars  a — and 
buying  jewelry  on  credit — wrist  watches  with  split  dia 
monds  for  crystals — and  they  rent  a  nice  house  and  ride  a 
horse  in  the  dining  room  and  shoot  the  china  right  off  the — 
It's  a  fact!  And  some  the  women — little  pink  ninnies  that 
don't  know  enough  to  come  in  when  it — they  get  fortunes 
for  just  making  eyes  at  the  camera,  and  they  rent  nice 
respect ablomes  and  hold — well,  orgies  is  the  only  word — 
orgies  is  just  what  they  are. 

"  It's  a  sin  and  a  shame,  and  if  something  isn't  done  about 


i88  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

it —    Why,  young  girls  flock  there  in  droves,  and  sell  their 
souls  and  bodies  for —    It's  simply  terrible. 

"A  gent 'man  who  claims  to  know  was  telling  m'usband 
— and  he  told  me — that  there  isn't  one  decent  woman  on 
the  screen — not  one.  Would  you  b'lieve  it?  Every  one  of 
them  has  to  pay  the  Price  to  get  there  at  tall. 

4 'He  says  to  m'usband  that  it's  the  regular  thing.  Before 
a  girl  is  engaged  she  has  to —  Those  directors —  Why, 
any  pretty  girl  who  is  willin'  to  lose  her  immortal  soul  can 
get  a  chance  if  she'll  only —  And  if  she  won't — why,  they 
turn  her  away. 

"I  declare  it  makes  my  blood  run  cold  just  to —  Don't 
it  yours?" 

"I  don't  believe  it,"  said  Mem. 

She  had  heard  a  vast  amount  of  gossip,  but  she  had  not 
heard  of  anybody  paying  such  an  initiation  fee.  She  had 
seen  a  great  deal  of  joy  and  some  of  it  reckless,  but  with  a 
childish  recklessness.  She  had  seen  no  vice  at  all. 

Mrs.  Sturgs  flared  up.  There  is  nothing  one  defends  more 
zealously  than  one's  pet  horrors. 

"Don't  believe  it?  Well,  that's  only  because  you're  so 
innocent,  yourself — speaks  well  for  your  bringing  up — so 
strict  and  all.  You  naturally  wouldn't  believe  folks  could 
be  so  depraved,  but  if  you'd  heard  what  I've —  Why,  it's 
true  as  gospel !  My  husband  had  it  from  a  man  who  knows 
whereoff  he  speaks.  They  sell  their  souls  for  bread,  and, 
as  the  Bible  says,  their  feet  lay  hold  on — well,  you  know. 
Any  girl  that's  too  honest  to  pay  the  Price  don't  get  engaged 
— that's  all — she  just  don't  get  engaged.  Of  course  there  may 
be  some  decent  ones,  old  ladies  that  play  homely  parts  and — 
but  if  a  young  girl  wants  to  succeed  in  that  business  she's 
just  got  to —  Oh  dear!  that's  my  car.  There 'snot  another 
one  for  half  an —  They  run  out  to  our  place  only  every — 
Good-by.  I  hope  to  see  you  again  soon.  Wait!  Hay!  Hay!" 

And  she  was  gone  into  the  infinite  purlieus  of  Los  Angeles. 
She  caught  her  car  and  it  slid  off,  gong  banging,  and  bunted 
a  passing  automobile  out  of  the  way  with  much  crumpling 
of  the  fender  and  the  vocabulary  of  the  driver,  but  no 
fatality.  Which  was  unusual. 


SOULS   FOR   SALE  189 

Mem  did  not  regret  the  abrupt  departure  of  Mrs.  Sturgs. 
She  was  glad  of  the  woman's  breathless  garrulity. 

It  had  not  only  left  her  with  her  secrets  intact,  but  it  had 
given  her  a  hint.  Mrs.  Sturgs  had  substituted  faith  for 
facts  and  had  spoken  with  that  earnestness  which  is  more 
convincing  than  evidence. 

Mem  accused  herself  of  blindness  instead  of  charging 
Mrs.  Sturgs  with  scandal.  She  felt  that  the  alleged  wicked 
ness  had  escaped  her  notice  because  she  was  too  stupid  to 
recognize  it. 

But  Mrs.  Sturgs's  accusations  had  the  same  perverse 
effects  as  her  father's  jeremiads.  His  sermon  had  made  her 
long  to  see  Los  Angeles.  Mrs.  Sturgs  had  suggested  an 
answer  to  her  own  riddle. 

She  wanted  to  act.  She  was  determined  to  act.  She 
needed  money.  She  must  have  money.  It  had  never 
occurred  to  her  that  a  pretty  woman  is  merchandise.  She 
had  given  herself  away  once,  and  now  she  found  that  there 
was  a  market  ready  ,and  waiting,  with  cash  and  opportunity 
as  the  price.  She  had  wares  for  this  market.  She  could  barter 
them  for  fame  and  future.  Since  she  could,  she  would. 

She  sat  on  the  bench  and  noted  with  a  new  interest  that 
some  of  the  men  who  passed  her  and  stared  at  her  had 
question  marks  in  their  eyes.  Up  to  now  she  had  shuddered 
at  the  vague  posing  of  this  eternal  interrogation.  She  had 
not  taken  it  as  a  tribute  of  praise  or  as  an  appeal  for  mercy, 
but  as  a  degrading  insult.  Now  she  thought  of  it  as  a  kind 
of  sly  appraisal,  a  system  of  silent  bidding,  auctioneering 
without  words — the  never-closed  stock  market  of  romance 
and  intrigue. 

These  men,  who  swept  their  eyes  across  Mem's  face  and 
tacitly  murmured,  "Well?"  had  nothing  to  offer  but  a 
little  sin  or  a  little  coin.  She  had  no  notion  of  the  rates. 
She  wanted  none  of  their  caresses  or  their  dark  purposes. 
She  wanted  the  light  of  glory,  opportunity;  so  much  fame 
for  so  much  shame. 

She  grew  grim  as  she  meditated.  The  Price  was  only  a 
vague  phrase,  but  she  was  ready  to  pay  it,  whatever  it  was. 
But  to  whom? 


SOULS    FOR    SALE 

She  brooded  a  long  while  before  she  thought  of  a  shop  to 
visit.  She  smiled  sardonically  as  she  remembered  The 
Woman's  Exchange  at  home  where  women  sold  what  they 
made — painted  china,  hammered  brass,  knit  goods,  cakes, 
and  candies.  Well,  she  would  sell  what  God  had  made  of 
her  for  what  man  might  make  of  her. 

At  the  studio  she  had  met  the  casting  director,  one  day 
when  the  commissary  was  crowded  with  stars  in  their  painted 
faces  and  gaudy  robes  and  with  extra  people  portraying 
Turks,  Japanese,  farmers,  ranchers,  ballet  dancers,  society 
women,  Mexicans.  He  had  been  introduced  to  her  as  Mr. 
Arthur  Tirrey  when  he  asked  if  he  might  take  the  va 
cant  seat  at  the  table  where  she  sat  with  Leva  and  another 
girl. 

He  was  an  amiable  and  laughing  person  with  an  inoffensive 
gift  of  flattery.  When  he  learned  that  all  the  girls  worked 
in  the  laboratory  projection  room,  he  had  exclaimed: 

"Why  waste  yourselves  in  that  coal  cellar?  I'll  put  you 
all  in  the  next  picture." 

The  others  had  not  taken  him  seriously.  Indeed,  they 
had  no  ambition  to  be  photographed.  Mem  had  often 
wondered  at  the  numbers  of  pretty  women  she  knew  who 
had  no  desire  to  have  their  pictures  published.  It  balanced 
somewhat  the  horde  of  unpretty  women  who  had  a  passion 
for  the  camera. 

After  the  lunch  she  had  learned  who  Mr.  Tirrey  was 
and  what  the  duties  were  of  a  casting  director.  It  wras  he 
who  said  to  this  one  or  that  one,  "Here  is  a  part;  play  it, 
and  the  company  will  give  you  so  much  a  week." 

He  was  the  St.  Peter  of  the  movie  heaven,  empowered  to 
admit  or  to  deny.  He  was  the  man  for  her  to  seek.  He 
had  seemed  a  decent  enough  man,  and  he  had  looked  at 
Mem  without  insolence.  But  you  could  never  tell.  Mrs. 
Sturgs  had  it  on  the  best  authority  that  the  only  way  to 
success  in  the  movies  was — "the  easiest  way." 

Mem  took  a  street  car  home.  She  was  glad  to  find  the 
house  empty.  Leva  and  the  others  were  out  on  a  canon 
hike,  dressed  in  high  boots  and  riding  breeches,  and  braving 
the  perils  of  rattlesnakes  as  well  as  the  frightful  men  who 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  191 

lurked  in  the  thickets  or  who  sprang  out  of  motors  and 
kidnaped  women  every  now  and  then. 

Mem  pondered  the  costume  appropriate  to  her  new  errand. 
She  was  going  to  lure  Lucifer,  and  she  was  afraid  that  he 
would  be  too  sophisticated  for  her.  But  her  problem  was 
solved  for  her  by  its  simplicity.  She  had  only  one  very 
pretty  gown,  so  she  put  that  on. 

She  studied  herself  a  long  while  in  the  mirror,  since  her 
eyes  and  her  smile  must  be  her  chief  wardrobe,  her  siren 
equipment.  She  practiced  such  expressions  as  she  supposed 
to  represent  invitation.  They  were  silly  and  they  made 
her  rather  ill.  The  face  in  her  glass  was  so  ashen  and  so 
miserable  that  she  borrowed  some  of  Leva's  warmest  face 
powder;  and  smeared  her  mouth  crudely  with  the  red  lip 
stick. 

It  was  a  long  journey  to  the  studio,  with  three  transfers 
of  street  car.  She  reached  the  lot  late  in  the  afternoon,  just 
before  the  companies  were  dismissed  and  the  department 
forces  released. 

The  gatekeepers  knew  her,  smiled  at  her,  and  let  her  in. 
She  went  to  the  casting  director's  office  and  found  him  idly 
swapping  stories  with  his  assistant.  He  spoke  to  her  cour 
teously,  and  when  she  asked  if  she  might  see  him  a  moment 
he  motioned  her  into  his  office,  gave  her  a  chair,  closed  the 
door,  and  took  his  own  place  behind  his  desk. 

The  telephone  rang.  He  called  into  it:  "Sony,  Miss 
Waite;  that  part  has  been  filled.  The  company  couldn't 
make  your  salary.  I  begged  you  to  take  the  cut,  but  you 
wouldn't.  Times  are  hard  and  you'd  better  listen  to  reason. 
You'd  have  had  four  weeks  of  good  money,  and  now  you'll 
walk.  Take  my  advice  next  time,  old  dear,  and  don't  haggle 
over  salary.  .  .  .  All  right.  Sorry.  Good-by!" 

He  turned  to  Mem  and  started  to  speak.  The  telephone 
jingled.  He  had  a  parley  with  a  director  who  could  not  see 
a  certain  actor  whom  Mr.  Tirrey  was  urging  as  the  ideal 
for  the  type.  They  debated  the  man  as  if  he  had  been  a 
racehorse  or  a  trained  animal.  Tirrey  spoke  of  him  as  a 
gentleman,  who  could  wear  clothes  and  look  the  part.  He 
had  been  miscast  in  his  last  picture.  He  was  willing  to 


192  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

take  three  hundred  a  week  off  his  salary  because  his  wife 
was  in  the  hospital  and  one  of  his  daughters  was  going  away 
to  boarding  school. 

Another  telephone  call — an  agent,  evidently,  for  Tirrey 
said:  " We  took  a  test  of  Miss  Glover.  She's  terrible!  Her 
mouth  is  repulsive,  her  teeth  ought  to  be  straightened,  her 
eyes  are  of  the  blue  that  photographs  like  dishwater.  We 
can't  use  her.  Don't  tell  her  that,  of  course.  Tell  her, 
we're  not  certain  about  the  picture;  we  may  not  do  it  for 
months.  Give  the  poor  thing  a  good  story." 

This  was  a  discouraging  background  for  Mem's  siren 
scenario.  But  she  was  determined  to  carry  out  her  theory. 
Mr.  Tirrey 's  eyes  looked  her  way  now  and  then  as  he  listened 
to  what  was  coming  in  through  the  wire. 

When  he  looked  away,  Mem,  in  all  self-loathing,  adjusted 
herself  in  her  big  chair  to  what  she  imagined  was  a  Cleopatran 
sinuosity.  She  thought  of  her  best  lines;  secretly  twitched 
up  her  skirts  and  thrust  her  ankles  well  into  view.  She 
turned  upon  Mr.  Tirrey  her  most  languishing  eyes,  and 
tried  to  pour  enticement  into  them  as  into  bowls  of  fire. 

She  pursed  her  lips  and  set  them  full.  She  widened  her 
breast  with  deep  sighs. 

Tirrey  seemed  to  recognize  that  she  was  deploying  herself. 
He  grew  a  little  uneasy.  Before  he  finished  the  telephone 
talk,  his  assistant  came  in  to  say  that  another  of  the  direc 
tors  had  decided  to  call  a  big  ballroom  scene  the  next  day, 
and  fifty  ladies  and  gentlemen  must  be  secured  at  once. 

"He  wants  real  swells,  too,"  the  assistant  said.  "He  says 
the  last  bunch  of  muckers  queered  the  whole  picture." 

Tirrey  groaned  and  said,  "Get  busy  on  the  other  wire." 
He  took  up  his  telephone  again,  used  it  as  a  long  antenna, 
and  felt  through  the  city  for  various  extra  people.  He 
advised  several  actors  and  actresses  to  lay  aside  their  pride 
and  take  the  real  money  rather  than  starve. 

His  patience,  his  altruistic  enthusiasm  for  the  welfare  of 
these  invisible  persons,  touched  Mem  with  admiration.  She 
could  not  see  where  or  when  this  Samaritan  could  find  time 
or  inclination  to  play  the  satyr. 

He  was  a  bit  fagged  when  he  finished  his  last  charge  upon 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  193 

the  individuals  and  the  agencies.  But  he  was  as  polite  to 
Mem  as  if  she  had  been  Robina  Teele. 

"What  can  I  do  for  you?" 

"I  want  a  chance  to  act." 

"What's  your  line?" 

"Anything." 

"Anything  is  nothing.    What  experience  have  you  had?" 

Mem  had  not  come  here  to  offer  her  past,  but  her  future. 
She  was  suddenly  confronted  with  the  fact  that  all  actors 
must  offer  themselves  for  sale — not  the  pretty  women  only, 
but  the  old  men,  too,  and  the  character  women. 

Actors  are  much  abused  for  talking  of  themselves.  Few 
of  them  do  when  business  is  not  involved,  but  when  it  is 
they  must  discuss  the  goods  they  are  trying  to  sell.  Shoe 
merchants  talk  shoes:  railroad  presidents,  railroads;  poli 
ticians,  politics;  clergymen,  salvation.  Each  salesman  must 
recommend  his  own  stock  and  talk  it  up. 

So  Mem  had  to  grope  for  experience  and  dress  her  window 
with  it.  And  she  had  had  so  little  she  lied  a  little,  as  one 
does  who  tries  to  sell  anything: 

"I  was  with  the  company  that  Tom  Holby  and  Robina 
Teele  played  in.  I  took  the  part  of  an  Arabian  woman. 
Mr.  Folger,  the  director — er — praised  my — er — work." 

"Well,  he  knows,"  said  Tirrey,  "but  he's  not  with  us, 
you  know.  Have  we  your  name  and  address  and  a  photo 
graph  outside  in  our  files?" 

"No." 

"Well,  if  you'll  give  them  to  Mr.  Dobbs,  with  your  height, 
weight,  color  of  eyes  and  hair,  and  experience,  we'll  let  you 
know  when  anything  occurs.  Everything's  full  just  now, 
and  we're  doing  almost  nothing,  you  know." 

He  was  already  implying  that  the  interview  was  ended. 
She  broke  out  zealously : 

"But  I've  got  to  have  a  chance.  I'll  do  anything,"  she 
pleaded.  He  looked  sad,  but  rose  and  shook  his  head. 

"I'm  sorry,  my  dear.  I  can't  give  you  jobs  when  there 
aren't  any,  now  can  I?  I'll  introduce  you  to  Mr.  Dobbs 
and  he — " 

He  moved  toward  the  door  to  escape  from  the  cruelty  of 


i94  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

his  office,  but  a  frenzy  moved  her  to  seize  his  arm  in  a  fierce 
clutch.  She  tried  to  play  the  vampire  as  she  had  seen  the 
part  enacted  on  the  screen  by  various  slithy  toves.  She  drew 
her  victim  close  to  her,  pressed  tight  against  him,  and 
poured  upward  into  his  eyes  all  the  venom  of  an  amorous 
basilisk. 

"I'll  pay  the  Price.  I  know  what  it  costs  to  succeed,  and 
I'm  willing  to  pay.  I'll  do  anything  you  say,  be  anything 
to  you.  You  can't  refuse  me." 

She  could  hardly  believe  her  own  ears  hearing  her  own 
voice,  though  her  pride  in  the  acting  she  was  doing  lifted 
her  from  the  disgust  for  the  role. 

He  looked  at  her  without  surprise,  without  horror,  without 
even  amusement,  but — also  without  a  hint  of  surrender. 
His  only  mood  was  one  of  jaded  pity. 

"You  poor  child,  who's  been  rilling  your  head  with  that 
stuff?  Are  you  really  trying  to  vamp  me?" 

The  crass  word  angered  her: 

"I'm  trying  to  force  my  way  to  my  career,  and  I  don't 
care  what  it  costs." 

Tirrey's  sarcastic  smile  faded: 

"Sit  down  a  minute  and  listen  to  me.  A  little  common 
sense  ought  to  have  told  you  that  what  you've  been  told 
is  all  rot.  But  suppose  it  wasn't.  Suppose  I  were  willing 
to  give  a  job  to  every  pretty  girl  who  came  in  here  and 
tried  to  bribe  me  with  love.  Do  you  know  how  many  women 
I  see  a  day — a  hundred  and  fifty  on  some  days;  that's  nearly 
a  thousand  a  week.  I  happen  to  have  a  wife  and  a  couple 
of  kids  and  I  like  'em  pretty  well  at  that.  But  suppose  I 
were  King  Solomon  and  Brigham  Young  and  the  Sultan  of 
Turkey  all  in  one.  A  hundred  and  fifty  a  day — really,  you 
know.  You  flatter  me!  I  won't  ask  you  how  I  could  do 
any  office  work  or  how  long  my  health  would  last,  but  how 
long  do  you  suppose  my  job  would  last  if  I  gave  positions 
in  return  for  favors?  And  if  you  won  me  over  you'd  still 
have  to  please  the  director  and  the  managers  and  the  author 
and  the  public.  How  long  would  our  company  keep  going 
if  we  selected  our  actresses  according  to  their  immorality? 

"It's  none  of  my  business  what  your  character  is  off  the 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  195 

lot — except  that  your  character  will  photograph,  and  a  girl 
can't  last  long  who  plays  Polyanna  on  the  screen  and  polyg 
amy  outside. 

"Just  suppose  I  gave  you  a  job  for  the  price  you  want  to 
pay  and  collected  my  commission,  and  then  the  director 
refused  to  accept  you,  or  fired  you  after  the  first  day's  test. 
What  guarantee  could  I  give  you  that  you  could  hold  the 
job  once  I  recommended  you  for  it?  And  what  would  the 
rest  of  the  women  on  the  lot  and  off  it  do  if  such  a  business 
system  were  installed  here  ?  What  would  the  police  do  to  us  ? 

"There's  a  lot  of  bad  gals  in  this  business  and  there's  a 
lot  in  every  other  business  and  in  no  business.  But  put 
this  down  in  your  little  book,  my  dear — there's  just  one 
way  to  succeed  on  the  screen  and  that  is  to  deliver  the  goods 
to  the  public. 

"The  danger  you'll  run  in  this  business  is  after  you  get 
your  job.  The  men  you  associate  with  are  mostly  mighty 
nice  fellows,  magnetic,  handsome,  good  sports,  hard  workers; 
otherwise  the  public  wouldn't  look  at  them.  Well,  you'll 
be  associated  with  them  very  closely,  and  you'll  feel  like 
a  bad  sport,  maybe,  sometimes,  if  you  try  to  be  too  cold 
and  unapproachable  when  they're  in  a  friendly  mood.  But 
that's  a  danger  you'll  meet  anywhere. 

"Forget  this  old  rot  about  paying  the  Price.  Good  Lord! 
If  you  could  sit  here  and  see  the  poor  little  idiots  that  come 
in  here  and  try  to  decoy  me.  I  get  it  all  day  long.  Your 
work  was  pretty  poor,  my  dear.  I  congratulate  you  on  being 
such  a  bad  bad  woman.  But  I'm  immune.  You'd  have 
failed  if  you  had  been  the  Queen  of  Sheba.  Now  go  on 
outside  and  tell  Mr.  Dobbs  your  pedigree  and  we'll  give 
you  the  first  chance  we  get,  and  no  initiation  fee  or  com 
mission  will  be  charged.  How's  that?  A  little  bit  of  all 
right,  eh?  You're  a  nice  child,  and  pretty,  and  you'll  get 
along." 

He  lifted  her  from  her  chair  and  put  his  arm  around  her 
as  a  comrade,  and  slapped  her  shoulder  blades  in  an  accolade 
of  good  fellowship. 

She  broke  under  the  strain  and  began  to  cry.  She  dropped 
back  into  her  chair  and  sobbed.  It  was  good  to  be  punished 


1 96  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

and  rebuked  into  common  decency  by  the  way  of  common 
sense. 

Tirrey  watched  her  and  felt  his  overpumped  heart  surge 
with  a  compelling  sympathy.  He  resolved  to  move  her  up 
to  the  head  of  the  endless  army  of  pretty  girls  pleading  for 
opportunity — the  bread  line  of  art. 

When  he  had  let  her  cry  awhile,  she  began  to  laugh, 
hysterically  at  first,  then  with  more  wholesome  self -derision. 

Her  eyes  were  so  bright  and  her  laughter  so  glad  that  they 
impressed  a  director  who  pressed  his  face  against  the  screen 
door.  Mem  had  been  so  deeply  absorbed  in  her  plan  that 
she  had  not  observed  the  other  door  standing  wide  open 
save  for  its  screen. 

Tirrey  asked  the  director  in  as  he  opened  the  inner  door 
for  Mem's  exit.  But  the  director  checked  her  with  a  ges 
ture.  Tirrey  presented  him  as  Mr.  Rookes.  He  had  to  ask 
Mem's  name.  She  gave  it,  from  habit,  as  Mrs.  Woodville. 

Mr.  Rookes  said  to  Tirrey: 

"I've  got  to  let  Perrin  go.  She's  no  good  at  all — no 
comedy,  no  charm.  She's  supposed  to  play  a  village  cutie 
and  she  plays  it  like  Nazimova's  Hedda  Gabler.  This  young 
lady  looks  the  type.  She's  very  pretty,  nice  and  clean 
looking." 

Mem  was  aghast  at  being  so  discussed,  yet  it  was  thrilling 
to  be  considered.  She  did  not  even  note  that  the  director 
had  neglected  to  demand  virtue  as  the  Price.  It  was  almost 
more  embarrassing  to  have  him  demand  her  experience. 

Her  story  improved  with  repetition: 

"Oh,  I  played  a  bit  for  Mr.  Folger.  He  said  I  was  won 
derful." 

"Was  it  comedy?" 

"Well,  not  exactly.  It  was  character."  She  was  trying 
to  talk  like  a  professional. 

"Would  you  mind  giving  me  a  test?" 

She  was  not  quite  sure  what  he  meant,  but  she  was  there 
to  pay  any  price,  so  she  said: 

"I'd  love  to." 

"It's  late,"  said  Rookes,  "but  I'm  desperate.  Come 
right  over  to  the  set  before  the  electricians  get  away." 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  197 

He  hurried  her  through  the  screen  door,  across  the  grass 
to  one  of  the  vast  warehouses,  and  there  under  a  bombard 
ment  of  grisly  lights,  with  a  camera  aimed  at  her  point-blank 
and  under  the  eye  of  various  men  in  overalls,  he  asked  her 
to  smile,  to  turn  her  head  slowly  from  side  to  side,  to  wink, 
to  laugh  aloud,  to  flirt  with  an  imaginary  man,  to  indicate 
jealous  vexation  at  a  rival. 

Rookes  was  fretful  over  the  snarl  this  small  role  was 
causing  in  his  big  picture.  The  delays  and  shifts  it  had 
compelled  had  already  added  several  thousand  dollars  to 
the  expense  account,  since  the  overhead  and  all  totaled 
nearly  three  thousand  dollars  a  day  even  with  the  recent 
cuts  in  salaries. 

He  assumed  that  Mem  knew  the  rudiments  of  her  trade 
and  could  use  the  tools  of  it,  which  were  her  muscles.  He 
gave  her  no  help,  painted  no  scene,  did  nothing  to  stimulate 
her  imagination. 

In  the  desert,  among  the  famine-wrung  people  in  costume, 
under  the  fiendish  sky,  it  had  been  easy  to  lift  her  eyes  in 
prayer  and  to  weep. 

She  found  out  all  of  a  sudden  how  much  harder  it  is  to  be 
natural  in  one's  own  clothes  than  to  play  a  poetic  role  in  cos 
tume  ;  how  much  harder  it  is  to  be  funny  than  to  be  tragic. 

She  could  not  smile  at  command.  Her  lips  drew  back  in 
a  grin  of  pain.  Her  wink  was  leaden. 

The  camera  caught  what  her  face  expressed  and  it 
expressed  what  she  felt,  which  was  despair.  She  had  her 
chance  and  she  was  not  ready  for  it. 

She  knew  that  if  she  had  been  droll  and  mischievous,  the 
director's  face  would  have  reflected  it  as  Mr.  Folger's  eyes 
had  grown  wet  when  she  wept  in  the  desert.  But  Mr. 
Rookes  was  merely  polite;  the  camera  man  was  mirthless; 
the  props  and  grips  stole  away. 

The  test  was  short.  Mr.  Rookes  said:  " Very  nice.  Ever 
so  much  obliged.  Mr.  Tirrey  will  let  you  know  how  it  comes 
out.  Thank  you  again.  Good  night!" 

And  now  she  must  find  her  way  out.  Tirrey  was  just 
driving  away  in  his  car  as  she  sneaked  through  the  gates, 
feeling  that  her  Paradise  was  gone  again. 


i98  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

She  had  so  little  hope  that  she  did  not  mention  the  expe 
rience  to  Leva.  She  had  no  ambition  to  promulgate  her 
failures.  It  was  success  that  she  wanted. 

For  once,  her  gloomy  forebodings  were  justified.  And 
ever  after  she  trusted  her  gloomy  forebodings,  often  as 
they  fooled  her. 

The  next  day  passed  with  no  summons  from  the  studio. 
But  the  mail  brought  her  a  letter  from  Mrs.  Dack. 

It  was  written  in  such  script  as  one  might  expect  from  a 
hand  that  clutched  a  cake  of  soap  or  a  hot  boiler  handle  or 
scrubbed  clothes  against  a  washboard  all  day  six  days  a 
week.  It  said: 

DEAR  MRS.  WOODVILLE.  I  was  awful  glad  to  get  your  letter. 
Been  meaning  to  anser  it  but  trying  to  fix  up  my  afairs  sos  I  and 
Terry  could  come  up  to  your  city.  Yesday  I  was  to  Mrs.  Reddicks 
and  she  said  she  had  a  tellagram  for  you  but  had  no  aclress  and  so 
could  not  forword  it.  It  said  your  mother  was  so  worrit  not  having 
had  no  anser  to  her  letters  she  was  comeing  out  on  the  first  train 
and  would  reache  Palm  Springs  day  after  tomorow.  Hopping  to 
see  you  soon  ether  there  or  here, 

MRS.  P.  DACK. 

P.  S.    Both  I  and  Terry  send  you  lots  of  love. 

Mem  was  petrified.  Nothing  could  stop  her  mother  from 
coming.  The  first  blaze  of  joy  at  the  thought  of  the  reunion 
was  quenched  in  the  flood  of  impossible  situations  her 
presence  would  create. 

Alone  with  her  skyish  ambitions,  her  contempt  for  village 
standards  had  been  sublime.  But  that  was  in  the  absence 
of  the  village.  It  made  an  amazing  difference  in  the  look 
of  her  new  ideals  and  practices  that  they  must  be  submitted 
to  a  mother's  eyes. 

Her  mother  did  not  know  Los  Angeles. 

But  then,  Mem  did  not  know  her  mother.  Daughters 
have  not  all  been  mothers,  but  all  mothers  have  been  daugh 
ters. 

Mem's  courage  turned  craven  before  the  wilderness  of 
her  problems,  unemployment,  poverty,  ambition,  Terry 
Dack  to  launch,  and  her  mother  to  educate. 


CHAPTER  XXIX 

D  EMEMBER  STEDDON  was  not  exactly  a  runaway. 
1\  She  was  a  walkaway.  She  was  not  included  in  the  pitiful 
beadroll  of  the  sixty-five  thousand  girls  who  vanished  from 
American  homes  that  year  and  caused  a  vast  pother,  though 
girls  have  been  running  away  from  home  since  girls  and 
homes  were. 

They  have  followed  the  cave  men,  the  barbarian  in 
vaders,  the  allied  troops,  the  caravans,  the  argosies.  They 
filled  the  primeval  factories  and  the  places  of  merriment, 
the  Corinths  and  Alexandrias.  Some  of  them  became  slaves 
and  some  sultanas,  priestesses,  royal  favorites,  empresses, 
tsarinas,  queens  of  song  and  art.  Some  starved,  some 
flourished. 

Mem  felt  that  to  go  back  would  condemn  her  to  ignominy 
and  futility,  while  to  stay  away  promised  a  chance  for 
wealth  and  glory.  She  heard  voices  calling  her,  saw  spirits 
summoning  her  to  the  skies,  no  less  than  Joan  of  Arc  did, 
and  perhaps  with  no  more  insanity. 

But  now  her  mother  had  found  her  out  and  was  pursuing 
her.  Her  mother  would  be  as  grave  a  problem  to  her  as  she 
to  her  mother. 

The  fall  from  the  cliff  that  did  not  quite  free  Mem's  soul 
from  her  body  had  quite  freed  the  little  parasite  soul  that 
was  to  have  been  her  conspicuous  fardel  to  bear  through 
life.  But  the  tiny  leech  had  begun  to  drink  her  blood  and 
in  its  death  it  tore  open  a  wound  that  would  never  quite  heal. 
Her  soul  had  bled  and  she  had  been  stricken  with  awe  before 
the  two  miracles  that  fastened  a  life  upon  hers  and  then 
wrested  it  from  her  before  it  was  quite  a  life. 

The  letter  she  had  written  her  mother  then  had  been 
the  instinctive  cry  of  a  child  beset  in  the  dark  by  some 
enormous  presence  passing  overhead. 


200  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

Just  as  instinctive  was  the  compulsion  that  drew  her 
mother  to  her  across  the  continent. 

Old  Mrs.  Steddon  had  raised  a  family  and  been  habited 
to  a  mother's  slumber,  light  and  fitful  and  broken  with 
frequent  dashes  to  bedsides  troubled  by  bad  dreams  or 
imagined  burglars  or  mere  thirst  or  a  cough.  Mrs.  Steddon 
had  always  flung  out  of  her  own  warm  covers  to  run  to  the 
call.  If  her  hasty  feet  found  both  her  slippers  or  one  or 
neither,  she  hastened  as  she  was.  She  would  not  have 
paused  for  a  wolf,  an  Indian,  a  murderer,  a  fire,  or  an 
earthquake. 

Mem  was  still  her  baby  in  the  dark,  and  it  did  not  matter 
whether  she  lay  needful  and  terrified  in  the  next  room  or 
beyond  the  deserts  or  the  seven  seas.  The  mother's  one 
business  was  to  get  to  her.  Her  telegram  was  her  old  night 
cry:  " I'm  coming,  honey.  Don't  worry.  Mamma's  coming 
to  her  baby."  She  shot  this  cry  across  the  continent  and 
called  Mem  "baby,"  although  Mem  felt  as  old  as  night. 

The  Reverend  Doctor  Steddon  had  wished  that  he  might 
go  along,  but  his  church  tasks  held  him  and  he  could  not 
find  the  money  for  two  fares.  The  lies  he  had  been  told 
had  succeeded  to  perfection. 

Mem's  efforts  to  hide  herself  and  support  herself  in  the 
wilderness  he  assumed  to  be  her  usual  unselfish  and  char 
acteristic  unwillingness  to  be  a  bother  to  her  father  and 
mother. 

Doctor  Steddon  agreed  with  his  wife  that  she  must  set 
out  at  once  for  Palm  Springs.  He  raised  the  necessary 
funds  by  lifting  still  more  of  his  little  savings  from  the  bank 
and  drawing  pauperdom  closer.  His  only  regret  was  that  he 
had  not  more  to  sacrifice. 

And  now  Mrs.  Steddon  was  following  Mem's  train  route, 
with  all  the  difference  in  the  world:  Mem,  a  young  and 
beautiful  girl,  had  had  all  her  fate  before  her  and  a  heart  of 
growing  audacity  and  reckless  ambition.  Mrs.  Steddon, 
an  old  and  shabby  parsoness,  had  all  her  hope  behind  her 
and  that  not  much,  and  a  heart  full  of  inexperience  and  of 
timidity  before  everything  except  self-immolation. 

When  Mem  learned  that  her  mother  was  already  on  the 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  201 

train,  she  could  devise  no  plan  for  turning  her  back.  Some 
how  she  had  to  be  met  and  provided  for. 

Every  one  of  the  women  of  Mem's  Hollywood  household 
was  out  of  work.  She  who  had  savings  was  lending  them 
to  her  who  had  not.  One  of  the  women  in  the  bungalow 
gave  up  the  fight  and,  putting  up  her  little  car  for  security, 
borrowed  from  Leva  money  enough  to  pay  her  fare  home 
to  the  village  and  the  scornful  relatives  she  had  sworn  never 
to  return  to  except  in  triumph.  The  servant  had  been 
released  and  the  stranded  women  were  cooking  their  own 
food,  such  as  it  was. 

It  was  this  dire  confrontation  with  bankruptcy  that  had 
goaded  Mem  to  her  insane  idea  of  pawning  her  virtue  for  an 
opportunity.  When  the  casting  director  had  given  her  a 
sermon  instead  of  a  quid  pro  quo,  she  had  found  herself 
abject  indeed;  even  her  shamelessness  repulsed  and  her 
last  trinket  proved  nonnegotiable. 

And  now  her  mother!  "In  every  deep  a  lower  deep!" 
But  Leva  responded  to  her  panic  by  an  almost  hysterical 
bravery.  She  laughed,  "I'll  dig  a  little  farther  down  in  the 
sock,"  and  added  the  trite  old  bravery:  "Cheer  up!  The 
worst  is  yet  to  come!" 

With  a  few  dollars  from  Leva's  waning  resources  Mem 
took  the  train  to  Palm  Springs,  her  one  remaining  hope 
being  the  confidence  that  when  she  returned  she  would  find 
a  letter  from  Mr.  Tirrey  saying  that  she  was  engaged. 

She  reached  Palm  Springs  in  time  to  have  a  little  talk 
with  Mrs.  Dack,  who  was  closing  out  her  business  and  good 
will  as  a  washerwoman  and  preparing  to  take  her  boy  Terry 
to  the  golden  city  of  Los  Angeles.  This  was  a  gamble, 
indeed,  and  Mem  was  frightened  by  what  she  had  set  on 
foot.  She  found  nothing  so  terrifying  as  having  her  advice 
accepted.  She  had  not  realized  what  an  army  of  children 
was  already  quartered  in  Los  Angeles. 

By  working  all  the  time  and  never  spending  much  Mrs. 
Dack  had  accumulated  a  pittance  that  looked  like  a  fortune 
to  her.  She  would  find  that  Los  Angeles  prices  were  net 
scaled  to  keep  retired  laundresses  in  luxury  for  an  extended 

^eriod.     But  that  was  for  the  future. 
14 


202  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

She  and  her  boy  and  Mem  stood  on  the  platform,  waiting 
for  the  up  train,  and  when  Mrs.  Steddon  dropped  off  the 
steps  Mem  put  her  right  back  on  again.  She  ran  forward 
and  persuaded  the  baggageman  to  carry  Mrs.  Steddon's 
trunk  on  to  Los  Angeles.  It  was  only  when  the  train  was 
flying  once  more  through  the  desert  that  she  and  her  mother 
found  a  chance  for  real  greetings — and  then  they  were 
restrained  by  the  presence  of  other  passengers. 

At  least  Mrs.  Steddon  was  restrained.  Mem  was  stimu 
lated. 

This  simple,  familiar  matter  of  a  mother  and  daughter 
meeting  again  after  a  long  parting  revealed  the  gulf  between 
them.  Mem  had  crossed  the  gulf.  She  had  dwelt  in  the 
blazing  sunlight,  in  a  bright,  a  gaudy  bungalow  with  noisy 
friends.  The  house  was  made  to  look  well  from  the  street. 
The  toil  of  all  the  inhabitants  was  toward  publication,  the 
entertainment  of  the  public.  Mem's  new  ambition  was  to 
parade  her  emotions  before  the  world  and  storm  the  world's 
emotions.  There  was  far,  far  more  in  this  than  mere  conceit 
or  ostentation.  She  wanted  to  help  mankind  by  educating 
and  exercising  its  moods,  as  even  the  most  ardent  evangelist 
is  not  without  anxiety  for  public  attention,  for  the  meekest 
has  his  pride  and  his  greed  of  notice  from  his  God  if  not  from 
his  public. 

So  now  Mem  felt  that  it  would  be  a  shame  to  let  these 
strangers  think  she  did  not  love  her  mother  tremendously. 
She  devoured  the  little  old  woman  with  kisses  and  caresses, 
and  she  did  not  keep  her  voice  inaudible.  That  was  her 
new  ideal  of  devotion.  She  was  advertising  her  love  a 
little,  but  no  more  than  religious  people  flaunt  their  creeds. 

Mrs.  Steddon  was  no  less  aglow  with  joy  in  the  recovery 
of  her  lost  lamb,  and  no  less  aware  of  the  audience,  but  she 
felt  quelled  by  it  and  under  an  obligation  not  to  disturb  it 
by  her  personal  emotions. 

At  home  she  lived  in  a  dull  old  house  as  devoid  of  archi 
tectural  fripperies  as  of  graces.  The  blinds  were  always 
down  and  the  ideal  of  that  house  was  that  the  neighbors 
and  passers-by  should  never  know  of  its  existence.  Good 
houses  were  seen  and  not  heard. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  203 

She  was  troubled  by  Mem's  voluble  enthusiasm,  her  warm 
clothes,  her  careless  rapture,  her  demonstrative  affec 
tions.  She  did  not  mar  the  festival  by  rebuking  her  child, 
but  she  grew  a  little  more  quiet  and  reserved,  as  if  to  give 
a  hint,  or  at  least  to  lower  the  average. 

Mrs.  Steddon's  body  had  traveled  thousands  of  miles, 
but  her  soul  had  not  budged.  She  was  just  what  Mem  had 
left  in  the  village,  looking,  indeed,  a  bit  more  village  in  her 
bonneted  shabbiness  than  before.  But  to  the  mother  Mem 
was  altered  almost  beyond  recognition. 

Her  spiritual  wardrobe  had  been  enormously  enlarged  and 
the  clothes  upon  her  body  were  of  another  world. 

Los  Angeles  has  fashions  of  dress  that  are  all  her  own. 
Many  of  the  moving-picture  people  are  conspicuous  anywhere 
by  their  sartorial  differences.  Even  the  wax  figures  in  the 
shop  windows  of  Los  Angeles  have  a  challenging  spirit  unlike 
any  other  waxworks.  The  dummies  attitudinize,  beckon, 
and  command  attention  by  their  uncanny  vivacity,  where 
the  indolent  wax  figures  of  shops  of  other  cities  are  content 
to  stand  still  like  clothes  racks  and  make  no  effort  to  sell 
their  wares. 

Mem  had  acted  a  role  in  make-up  before  cameras;  she 
had  learned  to  dance  and  swim  and  ride,  to  compete  with 
young  men  in  athletics,  business,  repartee,  and  flirtation. 
Her  body  was  no  longer  a  hateful  shroud  of  the  spirit,  but  a 
finely  articulated,  galloping  steed  for  the  soul  to  ride  and 
put  through  paces. 

She  was  so  changed  outside  and  in,  from  coiffure  to  foot 
gear,  that  at  first  her  own  mother  had  not  recognized  her  in 
the  young  actress  who  swept  down  upon  her,  flung  her  back 
on  the  train,  and  treated  her  as  a  fresh-air-fund  waif.  Later 
she  realized  with  embarrassed  admiration  that  this  brilliant 
butterfly  was  what  had  come  out  of  the  dun  chrysalis  that 
she  had  named  Remember.  She  had  loved  the  child,  but 
had  never  suspected  her  of  being  so  capable  of  so  many 
metamorphoses. 

The  swift  journey  from  the  mountains  and  through  the 
desert  into  the  orange  gardens  was  repeated  for  her  in  the 
journey  she  made  now  with  Mem's  soul. 


204  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

The  girl's  first  questions  were  eager  demands  for  news 
from  home;  but  then  her  talk  turned  all  to  herself.  She 
was  "selling"  herself  to  her  mother  as  she  had  tried  to  sell 
herself  to  the  casting  director. 

Mrs.  Steddon  had  been  prepared  to  find  a  scared  and  sickly 
child  in  a  shack  in  Palm  Springs.  She  had  come  as  a  rescuing 
angel.  She  found  that  her  wings  and  halo  were  old-fashioned 
and  her  child  doing  better  without  her  than  ever  she  had 
done  at  home.  As  Mem's  tongue  out  raced  the  train,  the 
dazed  mother  learned  that  her  baby  was  now  a  fearless 
adventurer  upon  the  paths  of  ambition;  that  she  was 
actually  one  of  those  appalling  creatures  known  as  an 
actress,  and  a  movie  actress  above  all  things!  A  movie 
actress  below  all  things! 

Mrs.  Steddon 's  comments  were  simple  gasps  and  reiterated 
"Well,  well's."  Mem's  autobiography  was  hardly  finished 
by  the  time  Los  Angeles  was  reached. 

And  now  the  abashed  immigrant  that  Mem  had  been 
when  she  faced  the  crowded  streets  and  the  taxi  comets 
was  as  sophisticated  as  if  she  had  been  a  native  daughter 
of  Los  Angeles.  She  sheltered  her  mother  as  if  her  mother 
were  a  new-come  immigrant  of  immature  mind. 

They  left  Mrs.  Dack  and  Terry  at  the  home  of  a  cousin, 
then  sped  on  to  the  bungalow. 

Leva,  who  ran  out  to  whisk  Mrs.  Steddon  into  the  shrimp- 
pink  residence,  found  her  calm  and  serene.  But  it  was  the 
calm  of  chloroform. 

She  made  no  resistance  to  Leva's  disposition  of  her  and 
her  things.  She  accepted  the  vacant  room  and  made  no 
demur  at  the  decorations  left  by  its  late  occupant — snap 
shots  of  rollicking  beach  parties,  of  horseback  rides  through 
canons,  of  Greek  dancers,  of  postal  cards  with  queer  photo 
graphs  and  queer  jokes,  portraits  of  stars  and  others,  all 
in  a  high  state  of  excitement. 

During  the  train  ride  and  Mem's  chatter  Mrs.  Steddon 
had  been  doing  some  earnest  thinking  in  a  little  private 
brain  room  just  back  of  the  auditorium.  Her  husband  had 
pledged  her  to  write  him  frankly  how  their  poor  child  was 
and  how  soon  she  would  be  strong  enough  to  be  brought 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  205 

back  home.  Mrs.  Steddon  had  promptly  realized  that 
Mem  was  far  too  strong  to  be  brought  back  home  at  all. 
She  realized,  too,  that  if  she  wrote  her  husband  frankly  just 
how  Mem  was  and  what  she  was  up  to,  Doctor  Steddon  would 
probably  fall  down  dead  in  his  study,  or  have  an  apoplexy 
in  the  pulpit  when  he  stood  up  to  scourge  the  sins  of  his 
congregation  and  felt  his  whip  hand  stayed  by  the  fact  that 
his  own  sheltered  pet  had  gone  wronger  than  any  girl  in 
town  of  recent  memory. 

Mrs.  Steddon  did  not  want  to  commit  murder.  She  was 
not  like  that  ancient  monster  of  self-preservation  who  said 
that  if  all  mankind  stood  on  a  balance  to  be  dumped  into 
hell  unless  he  told  a  lie,  it  was  his  duty  to  tell  the  truth. 

Mrs.  Steddon  was  one  of  those  craven  wretches  who  would 
have  told  a  million  lies  to  keep  one  poor  soul  from  being 
dumped  into  hell.  She  had  never  quite  understood  the 
extraordinary  precedence  the  truth  had  usurped  over  love, 
mercy,  courtesy,  and  convenience.  She  never  lied  in  her 
own  behalf  or  to  save  herself  from  blame.  She  sometimes 
lied  to  shift  blame  to  herself  from  her  children.  She  lied  to 
the  children  about  Santa  Claus,  about  how  quickly  bad 
children  are  punished  and  how  inevitably  good  children  are 
rewarded;  about  how  infallibly  right  their  father  was,  and 
such  commonplace  household  perjuries.  She  lied  to  her 
husband  incessantly  about  how  wise  he  was,  how  eloquent. 
She  applied  untruth  generally  as  a  kind  of  arnica,  a  first-aid 
panacea. 

Her  only  hesitance  now  concerned  just  what  untruth  it 
was  safest  and  most  satisfactory  to  tell  him. 

She  was  a  wicked  old  woman,  and  it  was  small  wonder 
that  she  rapidly  lapsed  into  enormous  popularity  among  the 
lost  souls  of  Hollywood. 

Fortunately,  her  daughter  left  her  alone  for  a  while  and 
she  had  time  in  her  bedroom  to  work  out  an  attractive  lie. 
She  must  say  that  Mem  was  well.  That  was  a  good,  solid 
fact  to  rest  the  springboard  of  fancy  on.  She  must  explain 
that  Mem  had  left  Palm  Springs  for  Los  Angeles.  Why? 
Well,  because  she  had  a  chance  to  improve  her  position — 
and  her  doctor  had  said  that  Palm  Springs  was  too  full  of 


2o6  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

palms  or  something.  A  doctor's  advice  was  the  best  bet, 
because  a  doctor  was  the  only  human  power  that  her  husband 
recognized  as  superior  to  his  own  impulses. 

Next,  what  was  Mem  doing  in  Los  Angeles  to  support 
herself?  She  had  written  that  she  needed  no  more  money 
from  home.  It  would  be  fatal  to  say  that  she  had  entered 
upon  a  cinematic  career.  And  it  would  be  adding  humilia 
tion  to  infamy  to  admit  that  she  had  lost  her  job  even  in 
that  inferno. 

Mrs.  Steddon  chewed  the  end  of  the  penholder  into  pulp 
before  a  light  from  some  place  inspired  her.  Old  Increase 
Mather,  in  explaining  how  old  witches  did  not  always  sink 
when  thrown  into  the  water,  observed  that  the  devil  can 
also  work  miracles,  and  it  must  have  been  Beelzebub  who 
upheld  this  old  witch  of  a  Mrs.  Steddon  in  the  deep  waters 
about  her. 

But  the  miracles  of  hell,  like  those  of  heaven,  confer  only 
a  temporary  benefit.  Doctor  Steddon  would  accept  her 
falsehoods  without  suspicion,  but  woe  unto  her  when  he 
should  learn  the  hideous  truth. 

For  the  moment,  however,  Mrs.  Steddon  was  inspired  to 
write  to  her  trusting  husband  that  she  found  Mem  in  very 
good  health  and  engaged  in  nice,  light,  ladylike  work  in  the 
public  library  at  pretty  good  pay,  considering  the  cost  of 
living ;  also  that  she  was  boarding  with  some  right  nice  ladies 
— also  in  library  work — at  the  address  given.  She  closed 
with  some  remarks  on  the  beauties  of  California,  a  land  the 
Lord  had  been  awful  partial  to. 

As  she  finished  this  letter  Mrs.  Steddon  felt  dizzy.  She 
wondered  if  her  giddiness  might  be  the  first  symptoms  of 
whatever  it  was  that  carried  off  Sapphira  and  her  husband. 

But,  remembering  that  Sapphira  had  fallen  down,  she 
decided  to  lie  down  first.  She  fell  asleep,  and  did  not  know 
that  Leva  Lemaire,  peering  in  and  seeing  her  there  stretched 
out,  white  haired  and  benign,  had  looked  upon  her  as  a  tired 
saint  and,  tiptoeing  in,  had  spread  over  her  a  Navajo  blanket 
of  barbaric  red  and  black. 

While  her  mother  slept  Mem  wept,  more  freely  and  copi 
ously  than  in  all  her  life  before. 


CHAPTER  XXX 

NO  word  had  come  from  the  studio  as  to  the  result  of 
Mem's  test  pictures.  There  was  no  telephone  in  the 
bungalow  to  ring  a  verbal  message  in  or  take  one  out, 

Mem  could  have  gone  to  a  drug  store  and  telephoned  from 
a  pay  station,  but  she  was  afraid  to  hear  her  fate  come  rattling 
out  of  the  little  rubber  oracle.  She  wanted  to  meet  her 
destiny  face  to  face  and  make  a  battle  for  it  if  the  issue  hung 
in  doubt. 

She  simply  had  to  have  work  now  because  she  had  her 
mother  as  well  as  herself  to  support.  She  was  still  too  new 
to  realize  that  need  is  not  a  recommendation  or  a  substitute 
for  ability.  In  so  far  as  it  has  any  bearing  in  the  case,  being 
hard-up  is  an  argument  for  disability.  Jobs  are  offered 
most  promptly  to  those  that  already  have  them,  and  those 
who  have  work  to  offer  rarely  seek  those  who  are  idle. 

As  Mem  hastened  along  a  palm-lined  avenue  to  her  street 
car  she  was  hailed  by  the  man  she  had  refused  to  dance  with, 
the  handsome  Mr.  Creighton  from  whose  arms  she  had 
fought  herself  free  in  rage  and  terror  the  first  evening  of  her 
arrival  in  Hollywood  when  he  tried  to  make  her  dance. 

Another  evidence  of  the  distance  she  had  traveled  was 
the  fact  that  she  had  danced  with  him  often  since,  and  that 
when  he  invited  her  to  step  into  his  automobile  she  hailed 
him  as  a  taxi-angel  and  ordered  him  to  rush  her  to  her  studio 
at  top  speed. 

He  had  bought  himself  a  new  racer,  a  long  underslung 
craft  of  desperate  mien.  "I  can't  afford  a  car,"  he  con 
fessed,  "and  it's  all  bluff,  but  when  you're  hunting  a  job  it 
makes  a  great  effect  to  roll  up  in  your  own  roadster." 

The  impudence  was  contagious  and  Mem  calmly  re 
marked: 


208  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

"I  must  get  me  a  car.  What  do  you  think  is  the  best 
make?" 

The  two  noncapitalists  blithely  juggled  thousands  of 
dollars  and  hundreds  of  horse-power. 

"What  effect  do  you  want  to  affect?"  said  Creighton. 
"If  you're  going  to  play  ingenues  you'll  want  a  shy  and 
virginal  auto;  if  you're  going  in  for  adventuresses  and 
heavies,  you'd  better  get  a  bus  that's  a  bit  sporty." 

Mem  thought  she  was  nobly  conservative  when  she  said: 

"I  shouldn't  like  to  be  too  conspicuous." 

"That's  right,  the  gaudy  old  days  are  over,"  said  Creigh 
ton.  "The  pioneers  out  here  went  in  for  plaids  and  gold 
brocade  upholstery  and  everything  outrageous.  Then  Jeanie 
MacPherson  made  a  sensation  by  having  her  car  painted 
plain  black,  and  now  almost  everybody  is  very  sedate — 
except  Roscoe,  of  course.  He  is  so  big  he  has  a  Jumbo  car." 

Mem  was  good  enough  actress  to  conceal  from  Creighton 
the  fact  that  her  interest  in  the  makes  of  cars  was  a  mere 
windshield  to  the  cold  gale  of  anxiety  playing  on  her  nerves. 
She  was  in  a  panic  lest  she  should  not  be  engaged  at  all. 
Her  immediate  problem  was  not  the  selection  of  an  auto 
mobile,  but  the  assurance  of  food  and  raiment. 

Creighton  rolled  her  up  to  the  studio  gates  and  waved  her 
good  luck.  She  faltered  when  she  entered  the  casting  office. 
She  almost  fainted  when  Tirrey's  assistant  told  her  bluntly 
that  there  was  "nothing  doing."  Mr.  Tirrey  had  so  many 
hearts  to  break,  so  many  hopes  to  sicken  with  deferment, 
that  he  avoided  the  ghoulish  task  when  he  could.  He  had 
warned  his  assistant  to  save  him  from  undergoing  another 
of  Mem's  assaults  upon  his  emotions. 

When  Mem  received  this  curt  facer  through  the  little 
window  in  the  door  between  the  waiting  room  and  the  outer 
office,  she  blenched  and  fell  back. 

The  room  was  full  of  anxious  souls,  each  with  its  despera 
tion.  There  sat  a  hungry  fat  woman  whose  bulk  had  kept 
her  employed  when  sylphs  had  had  to  wait.  Next  her  was 
a  gaunt  creature  who  could  play  Famine  or  a  comic  spinster 
with  equal  skill.  A  brace  of  sparrows  with  yellowed  curls 
that  looked  like  handfuls  of  pine  shavings  waited  with  their 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  209 

mother.  Three  beautiful  young  men  with  the  eyes  of  dying 
deer  perused  their  finger  nails  for  lack  of  more  exciting 
literature.  An  assortment  of  villains,  first  and  second 
murderers,  and  more  or  less  aristocratic  extra  folk  stood 
about,  hoping  against  experience. 

Scattered  among  the  laity,  they  would  have  passed  for 
ordinary  folk,  but,  grouped  here,  they  took  on  a  curiously 
professional  mummer's  air. 

Mem  stared  at  them  and  a  hot  resentment  thrilled  her. 
She  would  not  accept  a  place  in  this  mob  of  nonentities.  She 
went  back  to  the  window  and  motioned  to  the  assistant  cast 
ing-out  director.  She  pleaded  for  just  a  moment  of  Mr. 
Tirrey's  time.  The  assistant  said  he  was  busy ;  but  he  could 
not  snub  those  eloquent  eyes.  And  that  patient  man,  Mr. 
Tirrey,  with  a  Samaritanism  that  should  win  him  through 
Purgatory,  accepted  the  ordeal,  invited  her  in,  and  braced 
himself  for  the  familiar  business  of  the  undertaker,  the  old 
sexton  in  the  graveyard  of  art. 

"I  don't  think  you  realize  how  much  this  means  to  me, 
Mr.  Tirrey,"  Mem  began.  ''My  mother  has  unexpectedly 
arrived.  I've  just  got  to  support  us  both  now,  and  it  is  more 
important  than  ever  that  I  find  work." 

Poor  Tirrey  had  heard  this  so  often  that  it  ought  to  have 
bored  him.  But  he  could  never  quite  protect  himself  from 
these  expressive,  passionate  individuals  who  refused  to 
become  mere  generalities.  He  was  like  one  of  Saint  Hoover's 
men  doling  out  food  about  the  world.  Hunger  was  hunger 
no  matter  how  frequent.  But  he  was  unable  to  perform 
miracles  and  feed  hungry  thousands  with  a  few  loaves  and 
fishes.  When  his  loaves  and  fishes  gave  out  the  baskets 
were  empty,  and  the  rest  of  the  sufferers  must  go  vacant. 

He  said  he  was  sorry;  and  he  was.  He  would  keep  her 
in  inind.  He  would  not  forget.  Something  might  turn  up. 
When  Mem  failed  to  go,  the  busy  wretch  was  tormented 
into  a  slight  impatience.  He  stooped  to  self-defense. 

"You  don't  seem  to  get  my  angle  of  it,  Mrs.  Woodville. 
I  can  only  hand  out  what  jobs  there  are  to  the  people  that 
fit  them  best.  You  came  in  the  other  day  and  said  you  were 
so  ambitious  and  determined  that  you  would — er — sell  your 


210  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

honor  for  an  opportunity.  I  told  you  why  I  couldn't  make 
the  exchange.  Now  you  come  in  and  try  to  sell  me  your 
poverty.  That  is  even  less — ah,  marketable.  There's  a  big 
line  of  scared  and  hungry  people  always  forming  and  falling 
away  out  there.  Some  of  them  are  old  veterans  with  chil 
dren,  artists  who  have  done  fine  things  for  us.  But  we  have 
to  turn  them  away.  If  an  old  lady  with  sixteen  starving 
babies  asked  me  to  let  her  play  a  young  girl's  part  I  couldn't 
give  it  to  her,  could  I,  now?" 

"No,  but  I'm  not  an  old  lady  with  sixteen  children," 
Mem  persisted,  stupidly  stubborn. 

"No,  but  you  don't  suit  the  director  and  he's  got  the  final 
say.  Mr.  Rookes  gave  you  a  test.  He  saw  the  result  and 
says  you  haven't  got  comedy — at  least  not  in  that  part. 
Comedy  is  difficult.  It  takes  twice  as  much  skill  and  experi 
ence  as  romantic  drama.  You  may  have  it,  but  you  didn't 
show  it." 

"The  test  wasn't  fair!"  Mem  protested.  "I  didn't  have 
any  help.  He  just  told  me,  'Turn  your  head,  smile,  laugh, 
wink,  flirt.'  Who  could  do  anything  worth  while  like  that  ? " 

"I  know,  but  it  cost  the  company  about  fifty  dollars  to 
make  it.  It's  the  test  everybody  has  to  go  through.  Another 
girl  went  through  the  same  ordeal  and  she  made  good.  She 
got  the  job.  I'm  mighty  sorry,  but  the  only  job  there  was 
is  gone." 

Mem  struggled  to  her  feet  and  turned  to  the  door.  But 
the  sight  of  that  plank,  that  coffin  lid,  made  her  recoil.  She 
could  not  go  out  into  the  wilderness.  She  could  not  go  home 
to  her  mother  and  confess  failure,  accept  despair.  Her  lips 
wavered  childishly.  She  found  things  in  her  throat  to 
swallow.  Her  eyelashes  were  full  of  rain.  Her  diaphragm 
began  to  throb. 

She  cried  beautifully,  honestly.  She  was  not  artful  about 
it,  or  insincere.  It  was  a  gift.  She  suffered  with  exquisite 
ease  and  grace. 

She  was  one  of  those  pretty  things  it  is  hard  not  to  caress, 
in  whose  wail  there  is  a  keen  and  compelling  music. 

Tirrey  found  himself  more  dangerously  wooed  by  her 
grief  than  by  her  proffer  of  love.  Her  shoulders  were  piti- 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  211 

fully  round;  her  hands  groped  for  other  nands  to  help; 
her  eyes,  seen  blurred  and  monstrous  with  woeful  tears, 
were  more  beautiful,  somehow,  than  when  she  had  tried  to 
fill  them  with  seduction. 

His  heart  ached  to  draw  her  into  his  bosom,  kiss  away 
her  tears,  take  her  upon  his  lap,  and  soothe  her  like  a  child, 
one  of  those  terrible  children  that  Satan  pretends  to  be  when 
he  is  most  insidious. 

Mem  was  a  dangerous  weeper.  This  would  be  learned  in 
time  and  turned  to  her  great  profit  and  the  blissful  agony  of 
the  multitude.  She  was  not  acting  now.  She  was  reacting 
to  the  anguish  of  the  bitter  world,  its  cruelty,  its  bleakness, 
the  favoritisms  of  fate,  the  willingness  of  Providence  to  let 
the  willing  lie  idle,  and  the  ambitious  starve. 

Tirrey  paced  the  floor,  promising  Mem  all  sorts  of  won 
derful  futures.  He  managed  hardly  to  keep  his  hands  from 
her  by  intrusting  them  to  each  other  to  hold  clenched  behind 
his  back.  But  his  sympathy  only  fed  Mem's  self-sympathy 
with  new  fuel. 

At  the  screen  door  that  opened  on  his  office  appeared  Mr. 
Rookes,  the  director  who  had  rejected  Mem  after  the  test. 
He  did  not  know  who  was  crying,  but  his  emotional  soul  heard 
the  call  and  he  peered  in  through  spectacles  already  misted. 

Mem  saw  him  and  ran  to  him,  imploring,  "Please,  oh, 
please,  Mr.  Rookes,  give  me  a  chance!" 

Mr.  Rookes  had  a  priestly  regard  for  his  altars.  A  work 
of  art  was  as  solemn  and  as  chaste  a  burnt  offering  to  his  god, 
the  Public,  as  the  oblation  of  any  other  priest  before  any 
other  deity. 

It  was  just  as  sacred  a  duty  to  him  to  secure,  somehow, 
laughter  for  the  comic  scenes  as  tears  for  the  pathetic.  The 
Public,  that  shapeless,  invisible  ubiquity,  needed  its  mirth 
as  well  as  its  lamentations.  It  required  not  only  its  heca 
tombs  of  human  sacrifice,  but  also  beeves  and  bullocks, 
sheep  and  lambs,  doves  and  wrens  and  swallows. 

Rookes  knew  as  well  as  Shakespeare  knew,  that  the  pathos 
and  the  tragedy  suffered  if  there  were  no  attendant  buffoon 
ery,  no  relief  of  tension,  no  tightening  and  releasing  of  the 
springs  of  laughter. 


212  SOULS   FOR   SALE 

If  an  actor  could  not  command  laughter  he  must  not  be 
intrusted  with  comic  roles,  however  serious  his  necessities. 
Rookes  would  have  let  his  mother  or  his  daughter  die  rather 
than  give  her  a  part  she  could  not  play. 

Only  those  who  know  little  or  nothing  of  the  dramatic 
world,  or  whose  own  hearts  are  so  hard  that  they  do  not 
care  whom  they  wound,  pretend  that  the  world  of  mimic 
emotions  is  cold  or  cruel.  It  is  amazing  how  much  of  the 
theatrical  or  cinematical  time  is  spent  in  easing  the  inevitable 
griefs  of  the  vain  suppliants.  Mem's  sobs  so  agitated  Rookes 
that  he  finally  said:  "You  come  and  see  the  test  yourself, 
and  then,  if  you  think  you  ought  to  have  the  part —  Well — 
you  come  and  see  for  yourself." 

He  opened  the  door  for  her  and  led  her  out  into  the  lot. 
He  called  to  a  man  smoking  on  a  short  flight  of  steps : 

"Heinie,  have  you  that  reel  of  Mrs.  Woodville's  test  I  took 
the  other  day?" 

"I  guess  so." 

"  Put  it  on,  will  you." 

"Sure !     Go  in  Number  Two." 

And  now  Mem,  who  had  seen  so  many  faces  flow  by  in 
the  laboratory  projection  room  and  had  been  so  free  with 
comments  and  criticisms,  was  to  see  her  own  soul  unreeled. 
She  felt  a  sudden  rush  of  regret  for  her  harsh  judgments  on 
those  poor  creatures  who  had  had  to  fight  for  their  artistic 
lives  with  their  features. 

Rookes  escorted  her  into  a  small  cell,  dimly  lighted,  a 
screen  at  one  end;  at  the  other  a  few  seats  against  a  wall 
perforated  for  the  projection  machines. 

The  operator  in  his  room  at  the  back  snapped  off  the  one 
lamp  on  the  wall,  and  then  played  a  long  stream  of  light 
upon  the  screen.  Every  portrait  was  a  record  of  some  mood 
of  Mem's. 

It  was  weird  to  see  nerself  over  there  flat  and  colorless, 
yet  fantastically  alive.  She  was  face  to  face  with  herself 
for  the  first  time.  Science  had  answered  the  prayer  of 
Robert  Burns,  "Oh,  wad  some  power  the  giftie  gie  us." 

Mem  had  studied  her  mirror  and  still  photographs  of 
herself,  but  now  she  met  the  stranger  that  was  herself  as  the 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  213 

world  knew  her.  She  had  never  realized  her  features  as  they 
were;  nor  her  expressions.  She  could  look  at  her  own  profile. 
She  could  coldly  regard  herself  in  laughter  and  in  an  effort 
at  flirtation. 

The  miracle  of  miracles  was  that  her  very  thought  was 
photographed.  She  could  see  her  brain  pulling  at  her 
muscles,  as  one  who  stands  behind  the  scenes  at  a  puppet 
show  sees  the  man  aloft  and  the  wires  that  depend  from  his 
fingers  jerking  at  the  jointed  dolls. 

She  had  to  admit  that  her  smile  was  artificial;  her  lips 
drew  back  heavily  and  mirthlessly  from  her  teeth.  Her 
lips  were  prettier  than  she  had  supposed,  and  her  teeth  more 
regular,  but  her  smile  was  a  struggle.  Her  arch  expression 
was  clumsy.  Her  glance  askance  was  labored,  and  when  she 
executed  the  mischievous  wink  her  eyelid  went  down  and 
up  as  delicately  as  a  cellar  door. 

She  shook  her  head  and  wasted  a  blush  of  shame  on  the 
dark.  She  could  not  blame  Mr.  Rookes  for  rejecting  her. 
She  told  him  so,  and  he  was  grateful  for  that. 

"I've  learned  a  lot,"  she  said.  "I  wish  I  could  have 
another  try." 

"I  wish  you  could,  but  the  part  is  filled  for  this  picture. 
Another  time  I'll  remember,  but  it's  too  late  for  this  picture." 

He  heard  her  catch  her  breath  in  a  quick  stab,  and  he  was 
afraid  that  her  prayers  would  be  renewed.  He  hastened  to 
say: 

"Let  me  show  you  the  girl  who  got  the  part.  Let's  see 
what  you  think  of  her."  He  called  out,  "Oh,  Heinie,  put 
on  that  test  of  Miss  Dainty." 

"Sure!"  came  the  hail  from  the  man  at  the  wheel. 

And  then  the  white  beam  shot  forth  a  serial  portrait  of  a 
successful  rival.  This  girl  was  pretty  where  Mem  was  beau 
tiful.  She  was  superficial  and  frivolous  where  Mem  was 
deep  and  important.  But  she  had  the  vis  comica.  She  was 
as  sparkling  as  a  shallow  brook.  Her  eyes  danced,  mocked, 
flitted.  Her  lips  twitched  with  contagious  mockery.  Mem 
hated  her,  but  smiled  in  spite  of  herself,  giggled  in  spite  of 
her  wrath. 

This  girl  had  chosen  the  name  of  Dainty  to  replace  the 


2i4  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

misnomer  her  parents  and  her  forbears  had  fastened  on  her. 
She  lived  up  to  her  name  or  down  to  it. 

She  looked  pink  even  in  the  brown  medium  of  the  film. 
She  looked  round  and  mellow  even  in  the  one  dimension  of 
the  screen.  Her  soul  danced  back  of  her  eyes,  and  the  hand 
she  raised  to  peek  through  was  like  the  lithe  hand  of  a  Bac 
chante  in  whose  grasp  life  is  but  a  bunch  of  grapes,  spurting 
wine  at  the  least  pressure.  Her  very  fingers  were  tendrils 
and  her  hair  about  her  head  was  a  vineyard  wreath. 

She  had  her  sorrows,  perhaps,  and  her  woes.  It  was  prob 
able  that  she  was  heartbroken  because  she  had  been  denied 
a  tragic  mask  and  doomed  to  make  people  happy  instead  of 
profitably  sad.  But  whatever  her  private  woes,  she  shed 
gayety.  The  dark  and  ultraviolet  rays  were  lost  in  the 
prism  of  her  soul  and  she  reflected  only  the  narrow  rainbow 
of  good  cheer. 

"I  see  why  you  took  her,"  Mem  sighed.  "I  don't 
wonder." 

"It's  fine  of  you  to  say  that,"  said  Rookes,  and  squeezed 
her  hand  in  grateful  compliment.  The  kindliness  of  this 
set  the  girl's  regrets  off  again. 

She  went  out  into  the  sunlight  convinced  and  beaten. 
But  being  convinced  of  one's  unworthiness  and  confessing 
one's  defeat  are  not  consolations;  only  added  sorrows. 

Before  Rookes  could  escape  she  was  crying  again.  She 
loathed  herself  for  her  weakness,  her  poltroonery,  before  a 
disappointment.  She  called  herself  names,  but  sobbed  the 
harder  for  her  self -contempt. 

It  chanced  that  the  president  of  the  company  was  returning 
to  his  office  from  a  visit  to  one  of  the  stages.  This  was  the 
man  whose  name  was  familiar  about  the  world.  Every  film 
from  his  factory  was  labeled:  "Bermond  presents — "; 
" Copyright  by  the  Bermond  Company";  "This  is  a  Ber- 
mond  picture";  The  slogan  of  the  company  was,  "This  is  a 
Bermond  year." 

When  a  picture  succeeded,  the  star,  the  author,  the  direc 
tor,  the  photographer,  the  art  director,  the  continuity  writer, 
the  distributors,  divided  the  praise,  the  size  of  each  slice 
depending  on  who  awarded  it. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  215 

When  a  picture  failed,  the  producer  had  a  monopoly  of 
the  blame  and  the  entire  financial  loss. 

He  was  the  commercial  demon,  the  fiend  of  sordid  mer 
cantile  ideals.  Yet  Bernard  Shaw,  with  his  intuition  masked 
as  satire,  had  said  to  him,  "There  is  a  hopeless  difference 
between  us,  Mr.  Bermond:  ycu  are  interested  in  art;  I  am 
interested  only  in  money." 

As  a  matter  of  truth,  he  was  the  most  passionate  of  ideal 
ists,  compelled  to  keep  the  ship  afloat.  Like  the  captain  of  a 
ship,  he  had  all  the  final  responsibility  for  the  cargo,  the 
passengers,  and  the  shifts  of  wind  and  weather,  lie  must 
study  the  mystic  barometer  cf  public  favor  and  disfavor  and 
keep  the  prow  forging  ahead  in  calm  and  in  head  gale. 

He  had  to  build  the  ship,  feed  the  crew,  the  stokers,  and 
the  prima-donna  passengers,  and  keep  them  all  from  mutiny. 
If  the  ship  sank,  they  would  all  desert  him  and  he  would  go 
down  with  it  alone.  In  the  hard  times  he  must  sacrifice 
much  of  the  cargo,  cut  down  the  pay  and  the  rations,  shorten 
sail.  Otherwise,  the  ship  would  founder;  yet  none  would 
thank  him  for  taking  the  necessary  measures  to  keep  it 
alive. 

The  critics  would  blame  him  for  many  things,  but  they 
would  never  forgive  him  for  letting  the  ship  sink.  Success 
would  be  both  his  crime  and  his  condemnation,  but  failure 
would  be  no  atonement. 

Like  most  business  geniuses,  he  was  far  more  emotional, 
sensitive,  responsive,  audacious,  than  the  bulk  of  his  artists 
or  his  critics.  He  could  not  pour  out  his  emotions  in  song, 
verse,  impersonation,  or  gesture;  he  must  pour  it  out  in 
capital.  He  must  dig  the  capital  with  grim  toil,  and  he  must 
scatter  it  like  a  spendthrift  heir. 

With  him,  and  contrasted  with  him  in  build,  manner,  and 
spirit,  was  Jacob  Frank,  vice-president,  the  immediate  master 
of  the  crew,  whose  ideal  was  calm  judgment,  a  happy  ship,  a 
smooth  and  economical  voyage.  He  was  a  gentle  ruler  with 
a  twinkling  eye. 

When  Mr.  Bermond  heard  Mem  crying,  his  heart  hurt  him. 
He  did  not  like  scandal,  disorder,  confusion,  or  grief  on  his  lot. 

He  asked  the  distraught  Rookes  what  had  happened. 


216  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

Rookes  explained:  "A  bit  of  temperament.  She  wants  a 
part  she  can't  play,  and  she's  all  cut  up." 

"Oh,  that  is  too  bad!"  Bermond  groaned,  and  his  voice 
took  on  a  mothering  tone.  He  went  to  Mem  and  tried  to 
console  her.  He  took  her  hands  down  from  her  contorted 
face  and  forced  her  to  look  at  him.  Seen  through  the  cas 
cade  of  her  tears  she  wras  strikingly  attractive,  appealing. 

He  tested  the  public  always  by  his  own  reactions.  He 
judged  artists  by  their  influence  on  him.  He  felt  that  Mem 
was  somehow  an  artistic  weeper.  His  brain  was  alert  to 
make  use  of  ability  wherever  he  found  it. 

" Don't  you  take  it  too  hard,"  he  said.  "You  never  know 
your  luck  in  this  wrorld.  Many  an  artist  gets  thrown  out  of 
one  job  into  a  much  better  one.  I  knew  a  young  singer  and 
dancer  who  was  fired  because  he  was  not  good  enough  to 
come  into  New  York  with  a  cheap  show.  Two  days  later  he 
was  engaged  for  the  biggest  part  in  the  most  beautiful 
musical  piece  in  years,  and  ever  since  he  has  been  a  star. 

"If  the  first  manager  had  not  fired  him  the  second  would 
never  have  given  him  his  chance.  If  you  had  played  that 
little  village  vamp  you  would  maybe  have  played  it  so  badly 
we  should  never  have  engaged  you  again.  But  now — you  go 
home  and  wash  the  red  out  of  your  eyes,  and  any  day  now 
we'll  be  sending  for  you  to  play  a  big  part.  Sarah  Bernhardt 
failed  in  her  first  play,  you  know,  and  you  may  be  a  second 
Sarah  some  day.  Just  you  wait.  Now  that's  all  right." 

Mem's  eyes  were  filling  with  rainbows.  A  bystander 
drew  Bermond  aside.  Claymore  was  a  dramatist  who  had 
had  a  few  successes  before  he  established  himself  in  the 
moving  pictures  as  a  director.  He  believed  in  the  eternal 
verities  of  dramatic  expression  and  motive,  and  he  was 
skeptic  of  the  rituals  of  the  parvenu  priestcraft  of  the 
movies. 

"That  girl  has  the  tear,"  he  said  to  Bermond.  "That 
woman  you've  given  me  for  my  next  picture  is  God-awful. 
I've  spent  two  days  trying  to  make  her  cry.  She  has  the 
face  of  a  doll  and  she's  as  tender  as  a  billiard  ball.  She's  a 
confirmed  optimist.  She  couldn't  even  shake  her  shoulder 
blades  as  if  she  were  crying. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  217 

"Let  me  take  this  kid  and  give  her  a  real  test.  She  might 
have  just  what  we  want." 

"Sure!  Fine!  Go  to  it!"  said  Bermond,  and  hastened  to 
Mem  with  the  good  news  that  Mr.  Claymore — the  great 
Mr.  Claymore — was  going  to  give  her  a  chance. 

So  Mem  left  the  studio  shod  with  the  ankle  wings  of  hope, 
those  tireless  pinions  that  carry  the  actor  lightly  along  such 
dreary  miles  of  barren  road. 

As  she  hurried  through  the  gate,  one  of  the  studio  cars 
drew  out  and  the  driver  paused  to  offer  her  a  lift.  He  was 
taking  home  Miss  Calder,  an  actress  of  much  fame  as  an 
impersonator  of  women  of  various  ages.  In  the  picture  she 
was  then  engaged  in  she  carried  the  character  from  young 
motherhood  to  ancient  grandmotherhood. 

She  was  tired  as  a  pack  horse,  and  small  wonder.  She 
explained  to  Mem  that  she  had  been  called  at  six  in  the 
morning  in  order  to  be  breakfasted  and  made  up  for  a  nine- 
o'clock  appearance  on  the  stage.  The  dressing  of  her  hair 
and  the  filling  of  it  with  white  metallic  powder  that  would 
photograph  as  really  gray  was  a  long  and  wearisome  process. 
The  preparation  of  her  features  was  another. 

She  had  given  herself  to  racking  emotions  and  much 
physical  toil  since  nine.  It  was  now  six  and  she  had  not 
yet  had  time  to  remove  her  make-up. 

Mem  stared  at  her  in  the  twilight.  She  was  as  multi 
colored  as  a  sunset,  patches  of  white,  blue,  yellow,  green, 
and  red  gave  her  face  a  modeling  in  the  monochrome  of  the 
negative  that  could  not  be  imagined  from  her  present  bar 
barous  appearance.  To  complete  the  palette  she  had  painted 
her  eyelashes  lavender  to  soften  the  flash  of  her  keen  irises. 

When  she  got  home  she  would  take  off  the  laborious  fresco 
and  struggle  with  the  removal  of  the  powder  from  her  hair, 
because  on  the  morrow  she  must  go  back  for  a  day  of  retakes 
to  the  period  of  her  young  and  rosy  black-haired  bridehood. 

She  would  be  lucky  to  be  in  bed  by  ten  in  order  to  be  up 
again  at  six.  She  had  given  up  a  dinner  party  and  a  dance 
that  night,  and  had  known  no  recreation  for  a  month — was 
not  likely  to  know  any  for  a  fortnight  longer. 

For  this  toil  she  was  paid,  as  Mem  later  learned,  four 
15 


218  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

hundred  dollars  a  week.  But  it  was  not  much  compared 
with  the  ten  thousand  a  week  that  Miriam  Yore  was  known 
to  have  been  paid. 

Mem's  ardor  for  a  screen  career  was  not  to  be  blunted 
by  any  account  of  overwork.  Artistic  toil  was  what  she 
craved,  and  when  the  car  stopped  at  her  bungalow  she  ran 
to  her  mother  rejoicing,  as  if  she  brought  home  certain 
wealth  instead  of  a  gambling  chance  for  grueling  labor. 

She  paused  at  the  door,  suddenly  realizing  that  her  mother 
was  not  a  woman  of  theatrical  traditions,  but  the  devoted 
wife  of  a  preacher  who  abominated  the  moving  pictures 
all  the  better  for  never  having  seen  one,  and  whose  horror 
of  every  fiend  connected  with  them  was  the  more  unrestrained 
for  never  having  met  one  of  the  fiends. 


CHAPTER  XXXI 

MEM  entered  the  house  dreading  that  she  would  find 
her  mother  as  dismayful  as  a  stolen  child  flung  in 
the  corner  of  a  wagon  filled  with  gypsies.  She  found  her 
presiding  over  the  house  with  a  meek  autocracy. 

Mrs.  Steddon  might  not  have  been  so  daring  if  her  daugh 
ter  had  been  there  to  quell  her  presumptions.  She  had  stayed 
in  her  room  until  she  heard  the  racket  and  caught  the  savor 
of  dinner  getting.  Then  she  slipped  into  the  kitchen  where 
Leva  and  two  other  girls  were  bustling  about.  She  stared 
at  them  a  moment  and  announced  that  she  was  going  to  do 
the  cooking  and  the  housework  herself.  They  tried  to  shoo 
her  back  to  her  room,  but  she  amazed  them  by  her  gentle 
obstinacy  and  her  irresistible  will. 

"You  children  need  a  mother  more  'n  'most  anything 
else,"  she  said,  "and  I'm  going  to  be  one  to  you.  I  can't 
be  an  artist,  but  I  can  raise  a  family." 

By  the  time  Mem  arrived  the  girls  were  calling  her 
"Mother."  Sundry  young  men  who  drifted  in  that  evening 
were  soon  calling  her  ' '  Mother. "  In  a  week  they  were  kissing 
her  when  they  came  in  and  kissing  her  when  they  left,  bring 
ing  to  her  the  troubles  that  no  one  ever  gets  too  old  to  want 
a  mother's  eye  upon. 

Before  the  week  was  gone  Mrs.  Steddon  was  going  to 
parties,  to  dances,  to  beach  picnics. 

She  had  begun  her  downfall  by  writing  her  husband  a 
ghastly  and  elaborate  lie.  When  Mem  learned  of  this  first 
result  of  her  mother's  association  with  the  new  world,  the 
girl  felt  that  her  father's  opinion  of  its  malign  influence 
proved  his  insight.  But  then,  daughters  are  apt  to  agree 
with  their  fathers  in  theory  if  not  in  practice. 

Mrs.  Steddon,  however,  was  mother  first,  last,  and  all 


220  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

the  time.  She  acted  upon  impulse,  and  it  was  always  an 
impulse  of  adaptation  to  circumstances  as  they  rose,  and 
she  always  chose  the  role  of  protecting  her  own. 

Like  a  bird  on  a  nest,  she  spread  her  wings  over  her  young 
and  fought  for  them  as  best  she  could,  while  she  sheltered 
them  from  rain  or  wind  or  any  threatening  hand,  even 
though  it  might  be  the  divine  hand. 

What,  indeed,  is  the  whole  duty  of  a  mother  whose  daugh 
ter  is  uncontrollably  unconventional — or  worse?  Should 
the  matron  abandon  her  wayward  child  to  go  a  ruinous 
way  alone,  or  should  she  go  along  with  her,  hanging  back 
as  a  brake,  exerting  a  little  restraint,  being  present  to  lift 
her  when  she  falls,  or  comfort  her  in  her  shame  or  remorse? 
Mem's  mother  was  suddenly  confronted  with  this  problem. 
Her  village  child  was  at  large  in  Los  Angeles ! 

Her  chick  was  a  duck,  already  far  out  on  the  pond!  Mrs. 
Steddon  could  not  swim  in  that  puddle,  but  she  could  keep 
close  to  the  water's  edge.  She  did  not  even  cackle  remon 
strances  or  warnings.  She  just  waited  and  clucked  and 
offered  the  eaves  of  her  wings  as  a  shelter. 

And  so  the  old  village  parson's  wife  abruptly  found  herself 
or  made  herself  a  theatrical  mamma.  This  sort  of  mother 
has  been  often  presented,  but  rarely  without  caricature, 
almost  never  with  understanding. 

Because  she  is  apt  to  grow  a  little  stagy  and  to  forget 
her  years  and  the  solemnity  expected  of  them;  because  her 
daughter  is  pretty  sure  to  be  unmanageable,  she  is  dealt 
with  more  harshly  than  the  more  familiar  mother  who  per 
suades  her  daughter  to  become  a  housewife  and  to  marry  a 
substantial  husband  instead  of  a  romantic  lover;  than  the 
mother  who  keeps  her  daughter  from  suing  an  adulterous 
or  a  cruel  husband  for  divorce,  than  the  mother  who  fears 
the  gossip  of  the  neighbors  more  than  the  smothered  infamies 
of  a  hypocritical  home;  than  the  mother  who  endures  every 
drudgery,  skulduggery,  and  shame,  and  destroys  her  own 
birthright  to  deceive  her  children. 

These  others  are  familiar  ancient  mothers  dwelling  wretch 
edly  in  a  sordid  martyrdom.  Sometimes  they  are  saints 
of  patience  and  their  long  agonies  are  rewarded.  Some- 


SOULS   FOR   SALE  221 

times  their  devotion  has  a  morbid,  almost  an  obscene  and 
witchlike,  aspect. 

But  the  theatrical  mother  must  share  the  limelight  of 
publicity  with  her  public  child.  She  must  seem  to  approve 
or  connive  in  the  real  or  alleged  indiscretions  of  her  own 
child,  and  she  is  liable  to  the  accusation  of  being  a  procuress 
or  a  corrupt  and  odious  shield.  Sometimes,  indeed,  she  is  a 
grafter,  a  blood  sucker,  a  vender  of  her  child's  future,  renting 
a  tot  for  wages  and  spending  them  on  herself  instead  of 
investing  them  for  the  child's  future. 

But  the  movies  did  not  invent  wicked  parents.  Since  time 
was,  children  have  been  driven  to  the  streets,  the  mines, 
the  looms. 

The  movie  mammas,  at  least,  at  worst,  did  not  drive 
their  children  into  the  dark,  to  grimy  toil  and  heartbroken 
obscurity,  but  to  sunlight,  beauty,  play,  fame,  and  infinite 
praise. 

Many  a  movie  mother  had  been  what  Mrs.  Steddon  had 
been.  Mrs.  Steddon  would  in  time  be  as  harshly  criticized 
as  the  worst  of  the  others. 

Her  own  daughter  was  the  first  to  feel  uneasy.  Mem 
had  expected  her  mother  to  be  horrified  by  the  new  sur 
roundings.  She  had  braced  herself  to  defend  the  art  life 
against  prejudice.  She  was  disappointed  of  the  support 
that  criticism  gives.  To  break  rules  and  to  disobey  and  shock 
the  elders  are  among  the  chief  fascinations  and  consolations 
of  having  to  endure  youth. 

But  when  the  parents  and  the  oldsters  fail  to  make  rules 
or  to  protest  against  infractions  of  the  rules  they  make,  the 
young  are  robbed  of  something  precious. 

When  the  elders  go  farther  and  join  the  young  in  their 
rebellion  against  old  dignities,  then  indeed  are  the  young 
outraged. 

So  Mem  was  shocked  because  her  mother  was  not.  Mem 
could  have  grown  eloquent  in  upholding  the  bohemian 
standards  of  behavior;  she  had  superbly  denounced  the 
village  hypocrisies  and  pruderies.  But  when  the  villager 
accepted  bohemia  and  reveled  in  its  revels,  what  was  a 
daughter  to  do? 


222  SOULS   FOR   SALE 

One  thing  was  soon  evident.  Mrs.  Steddon  would  not  go 
back  to  Calverly;  she  would  not  urge  Mem  to  go  back; 
and  she  prepared  to  do  in  Rome  as  the  Romans  did. 

Mem  could  not  imagine  what  a  task  it  all  was  to  her 
mother,  because  she  had  never  been  a  wife,  a  parson's  wife, 
in  a  small-town  church.  She  had  not  known  the  sickening 
monotony  of  a  life  devoted  to  avoiding  life,  to  couching 
even  the  terms  of  normal  connubial  raptures  in  pompous 
terms  of  religious  exaltation.  She  had  not  known  how  weari 
some  devoutness  becomes  when  it  is  made  a  trade,  a  mer 
chandise,  a  livelihood. 

Mrs.  Steddon  had  been  a  girl,  a  wild  young  female  with 
natural  instincts  and  gayeties  and  a  natural  impulse  to  kick 
over  the  restraints  of  the  respectable.  She  had  fallen  in 
love  with  a  man  whose  passion  was  dogma  and  whose  prime 
study  was  the  whims  of  a  mystic  Deity  before  whose  vague 
edicts  he  prostrated  himself.  She  cared  nothing  for  doctrines 
and  hair-splitting  interpretations  of  ancient  texts,  but  she 
gave  herself  up  to  the  prison  of  the  parsonage  with  bravery 
and  good  cheer.  She  suppressed  her  wrath  against  the  pious 
frauds  and  the  cruel  niggards  who  made  her  husband's  life 
a  treadmill  of  unrewarded  ambitions.  She  bore  her  children 
and  did  her  best  to  coax  them  toward  the  ideals  their  father 
thundered  about  their  unruly  heads.  She  might  have  been 
a  nightingale  or  a  skylark,  but  she  consented  to  be  caged 
and  to  chirp  a  little  song  and  forego  her  wings. 

Now,  however,  the  cage  was  opened.  She  had  been 
decoyed  into  a  garden  where  birds  of  rich  plumage  flung  from 
branch  to  branch  in  a  pride  of  wings  and  rhapsodies  of  song. 

She  was  too  old  to  dart  and  carol,  but  she  would  not  build 
a  cage  about  herself  and  continue  to  mope. 

The  freedom,  the  franchise  of  the  sky,  the  glory  of  liberty 
that  art  gives  its  practicers  and  their  companions,  were 
hers,  and  the  drab  little  woman  accepted  a  tiny  corner  of 
this  heaven  as  her  very  own. 

At  first  a  mother  is  only  a  gangplank  for  souls  to  cross 
from  nowhere  into  this  world.  Once  ashore,  the  mother  can 
do  less  and  less  for  the  child.  If  she  can  become  the  compan 
ion,  philosopher,  and  friend,  that  is  much.  But  it  serves  the 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  223 

child  no  good  purpose  for  the  mother  to  give  up  all  interest 
in  her  own  career  and  accept  inanition.  The  best  of  a 
woman's  life  may  well  be  that  part  of  it  which  follows  the 
departure  of  her  last  grown  child  from  the  home.  Let  the 
mother  follow  her  flock  out  into  the  world. 

But  Mrs.  Steddon's  emancipation  was  for  Mem  to  dis 
cover  with  amazement  gradually.  For  the  moment  she  was 
too  much  absorbed  in  her  mad  hopes  to  consider  her  mother's 
belated  debut  into  the  full  light  of  day. 

The  next  morning  found  her  at  the  studio  betimes,  bor 
rowing  mascaro  and  advice  from  Miss  Calder,  who  experi 
mented  with  her  skin  as  in  a  laboratory  and  delivered  a 
scientific  discourse  on  the  epidermis  and  its  preparation  for 
the  camera. 

Claymore  was  waiting  for  Mem  when  she  came  down  the 
steps  from  the  long  gallery  of  the  women's  dressing  rooms. 
She  was  daubed,  smeared,  lined,  powdered,  rouged,  mas- 
caroed,  and  generally  calcimined  for  duty.  Her  heart  was 
beating  in  alternate  throbs  of  fear  and  frenzy.  Her  feet 
were  at  the  brink  of  the  Rubicon. 


CHAPTER  XXXII 

PHE  scene  of  her  endeavor  was  to  be  a  drawing-room 
1  built  and  decorated  for  an  unfinished  picture  whose 
company  was  now  in  the  Mojave  Desert  practicing  art  on 
the  edge  of  Death  Valley. 

Claymore  had  provided  a  camera  man,  a  few  men  to 
handle  the  electric  lights,  a  property  man,  and  even  a  pair 
of  musicians — a  violinist  and  the  treader  of  a  wheezy  little 
portable  melodeon.  Where  the  ceiling  of  the  drawing-room 
should  have  been  was  a  platform  on  which  a  number  of 
downward-pointing  spotlights  were  arrayed  in  the  charge 
of  a  man  called  "Mike."  From  the  scaffoldings  above  hung 
great  dome  lights,  the  "ash  cans."  In  the  windows  and 
doors  other  spotlights  were  ambushed,  each  group  with  its 
attendant,  and,  where  the  fourth  wall  was  removed,  tall 
iron  frames  held  rows  of  Cooper-Hewitt  tubes  like  harp 
strings,  and  sun  arcs,  Winfield,  and  Kliegl  lights,  and  other 
instruments  of  torture  connected  by  cables  to  various 
switchboards. 

The  concentrated  radiance  burned  out  the  eyes  in  time, 
or  brought  on  a  painful  temporary  blindness.  To  the  new 
comer  there  was  an  insanity  about  the  extravagance  of  glare. 
But  the  finished  result  reduced  the  flame  to  a  twilight  and 
explained  the  necessity,  for  each  picture  could  be  exposed 
for  only  the  sixteenth  of  a  second,  and  in  its  tiny  frame  of 
hardly  more  than  a  square  inch  it  must  compress  enough 
definition  to  cover,  when  projected,  a  screen  thousands  of 
times  its  size. 

When  Mem  walked  on  the  great  stage  and  followed  Clay 
more  into  the  little  space  allotted  to  her,  she  noted  the 
waiting  crew  of  spectators  and  her  heart  faltered.  How 
could  she  give  her  soul  to  emotions  in  the  presence  of  these 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  225 

strangers?  It  would  be  like  stripping  herself  and  dancing 
stark  before  a  band  of  peeping  Toms.  But  needs  must 
when  ambition  drives. 

Claymore  marched  her  into  the  scene  and  asked  her  to 
stand  while  the  camera  man  made  his  set-up  for  a  long  shot. 
The  electricians  trundled  their  batteries  forward  and  turned 
them  on  her;  the  camera  man  advanced  upon  her  with  the 
tape  measure  and  went  back  to  squint  at  her  through  the 
finder.  He  stared  at  her  through  a  color  filter  of  deep  blue 
and  discussed  her  hair  and  her  eyes.  Claymore  came  for 
ward,  carrying  a  rouge  stick  he  had  borrowed  from  some 
body's  forgotten  make-up  box,  and  gave  Mem's  mouth  a 
little  extra  length,  put  a  dot  next  the  inner  comer  of  each 
eye,  and,  taking  a  powder  puff,  dusted  her  brow  lightly 
where  the  perspiration  of  terror  was  beginning  to  shine. 

Then  he  gave  her  a  little  of  what  he  called  footwork. 

"Go  back  to  that  door  and  come  forward  to  this  spot. 
Shake  hands  with — er — with  your  lover — er —  Well — no. 
Let  me  see.  That's  too  simple.  Let's  get  down  to  business.  • 

"You've  a —  Oh — well,  just  for  instance,  you've  been — 
er — betrayed  and  your  child  has  died  and  you've  been 
accused  of  murdering  it  and  you're  now  being  called  before 
the  judge  and  the  jury.  Do  you  get  me?  You're  coming 
into  a  courtroom  under  a  charge  of  crime;  you  feel  your 
shame,  but  you're  innocent  of  the  charge,  yet  you're  over 
whelmed  with  guilt  for  your  fall,  and  the  father  of  the  child 
is — was  killed  in  the  war,  say — and  you  don't  much  care 
whether  you  live  or  die;  so  you're  in  despair,  yet  defiant. 
That's  a  triple  layer  of  emotion  for  you  and  I  don't  suppose 
you  can  get  much  of  it  over,  but — just  try  to  give  the  at 
mosphere  of  it.  Now  back  to  the  door.  Walk  through  it 
once." 

Claymore  was  as  much  embarrassed  as  Mem,  for  his  inven 
tion  was  not  in  its  best  working  order  so  early  in  the  morning. 
He  felt  as  silly  as  a  man  badgered  by  a  peevish  child  to  tell 
a  story. 

But  his  trite  plot  stirred  Mem  amazingly.  He  could  not 
know  how  close  his  random  shots  had  come  home  to  her 
and  flung  her  back  from  the  forward-looking  artist  to  the 


226  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

lorn  fugitive  who  had  stumbled  into  California  laden  with 
disgrace. 

She  was  all  atremble  and  her  eyes  darted,  her  fingers 
twitched.  Claymore  marveled  at  her  instantaneous  response 
to  his  suggestion.  There  were  born  artists  who  shivered  on 
the  least  breath  of  inspiration  and  suggestion. 

His  first  impression  of  Mem  was  that  he  had  found  a 
genius,  and  he  fought  against  the  obstacles  he  encountered 
later  with  the  zest  of  a  man  digging  toward  known  gold. 

In  a  kind  of  stupor  Mem  obeyed  his  commands  like  the 
trained  confederate  of  a  hypnotist.  She  went  to  the  door, 
came  in  reluctant,  shamefast,  doomed.  She  advanced 
slowly  till  she  reached  the  edge  of  the  rug  he  had  indicated, 
then  halted,  and  with  a  fierce  effort  hoisted  her  head  in 
defiance  and  braved  the  lightning  of  the  judge. 

She  heard  Claymore  call  to  her:  "That's  fine!  Now  we'll 
take  it!" 

She  started  back,  but  was  checked  by  the  camera  man's 
"Wait,  please!"  He  ran  forward  and  shouted  directions  on 
all  sides  for  lights. 

"Hit  those  spots!  Throw  the  ash  can  on  her.  Bring  up 
that  Kliegl.  Put  a  diffuser  on  that  Winfield.  What's  the 
matter  with  the  second  spot?  Your  carbons  are  flickering. 
Mike !  Mike !  Trim  those  carbons  on  the  second  spot !  Pull 
em!" 

Then  the  lights  went  out  and  there  was  a  wait  while  Mike 
ran  along  the  gallery  parallel,  with  tweezers  in  his  gloved 
hands.  When  Mike  was  ready  the  camera  man  shouted: 
"Hit  'em!  All  right,  Mr.  Claymore!"  Mr.  Claymore 
called,  "Music,  please!" 

And  Mem  found  herself  in  a  sea  of  blazing  radiance  trem 
ulous  with  a  shimmer  of  music. 

She  went  back  to  the  door  and  nodded  when  Claymore's 
"Are  you  ready?"  penetrated  the  myth  realm  from  far 
away.  She  heard  him  murmur :  "Camera!  Action!"  and  she 
heard  his  voice  reciting  an  improvised  libretto  for  her 
pantomime. 

"You've  come  from  your  dark  cell !  The  light  blinds  you ! 
You  begin  to  see  the  angry  public,  the  cruel  judge.  You 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  227 

flinch.  You  fall  back.  'They  are  going  to  sentence  me  to 
death!'  'They  are  hissing  me  because  I  loved  too  well!' 
'But  my  little  baby!  They  said  I  killed  him!  They  can't 
know  how  I  loved  him!  how  I  felt  his  little  hands  on  my 
cheek,  his  lips  at  my  breast!  how  I  suffered  when  his  cheek 
grew  cold!  O  God!  I  prayed  for  his  life  even  though  it 
meant  eternal  shame!  But  he  is  gone!  My  lover  is  dead! 
What  is  this  world  to  me ! '  Wring  your  hands !  Look  up  at 
the  judge !  Draw  yourself  up !  Defy  him !  That's  it !  Now 
let  the  tears  come!  'My  baby,  I  am  coming  to  you!  My 
baby!'" 

She  heard  his  voice  wailing  and  trembling  like  the  vox 
humana  stop  the  village  organist  used  to  pull  out  for  the 
sake  of  pathos.  It  was  maudlin,  unforgivably  cheap  and 
trashy,  yet  it  was  the  truth  for  her,  as  for  millions  of  other 
girls.  It  was  trite  because  it  had  broken  so  many  hearts. 

She  felt  a  fool,  a  guilty  fool.  The  music,  the  lights,  the 
director's  voice — all,  all  was  insanity.  But  it  swept  her 
heartstrings  with  an  ^Eolian  thrill  and  they  sang  with  a 
mad  despair. 

She  vaguely  knew  that  the  camera  crank  had  ceased  to 
purr ;  she  heard  the  clop  of  the  levers  shutting  off  the  lights ; 
the  music  was  ended.  But  her  suffering  went  on ;  she  could 
not  stop  crying. 

Her  head  bent,  her  taut  body  broke  at  the  waist,  she  war 
sobbing  into  a  corner  of  her  elbow  and  dropping  to  the  floor 
when  Claymore  caught  her  and  upheld  her,  eased  her  to  Q 
chair,  and  stood  patting  her  back  idiotically  and  saying1. 
"Fine!  Fine!" 

She  looked  up  to  see  if  he  were  mocking  her,  and  saw  that 
his  cheeks  were  streaked  with  tears.  The  camera  man  was 
doleful  as  if  he  mourned,  and  the  property  man  was  turning 
away  to  blow  his  nose. 

Mem  began  to  laugh — the  laugh  of  triumph.  Yet  she  felt 
that  she  had  cheated  a  little.  The  director  had  stabbed  an 
old  wound  by  accident  and  unsealed  an  old  fountain  of  tears. 

He  had  exhausted  her  dramatic  experience  of  life  already, 
and  he  would  find  her  imagination  unschooled,  her  mental 
and  physical  agility  all  to  seek. 


228  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

But  he  had  touched  her  once.  She  had  responded  once  to 
the  call  and  had  given  the  strange  authority  of  reality  to  a 
feigned  adventure  of  her  soul. 

"She's  got  it  in  her!"  he  mumbled  to  the  camera  man. 

And  the  camera  man,  with  eyes  still  murky,  grumbled: 
"The  real  thing!" 

Now  Claymore  cast  about  for  the  next  test. 

"You've  got  the  gift  of  tears,"  he  said.  "Now  let's  try 
a  bit  of  drama!  Let's  exaggerate  and  chew  up  the  scenery 
and  tear  a  passion  to  tatters,  for  it's  easy  to  tone  you  down 
when  you  overdo,  but  it's  hard  to  pep  you  up  if  you're 
flat." 

He  cudgeled  his  brain  for  an  excuse  for  ranting,  towering 
rage.  He  chose  one  of  those  scenes  innumerably  done  in 
the  moving  pictures,  a  sordid  pattern  common  enough  in 
real  life  through  the  ages,  but  all  too  crowded  in  the  movies, 
infinitely  multiplied  and  repeated  until  it  became  boresome 
to  the  frequenters  of  the  films  and  nauseated  the  moralists, 
gave  them  excuse  for  a  general  assault  on  the  whole  art  and 
industry. 

Claymore  took  up  a  heap  of  tarpaulin  and  piled  it  on  a 
chair  to  represent  a  man,  found  a  screw  driver  left  on  the 
scene  by  a  carpenter,  and  gave  it  to  Mem  for  a  pistol.  Then 
he  outlined  a  scenario  startling  and  bewildering  to  her,  and 
utterly  uncongenial  to  her  character  and  experience: 

"This  tarpaulin  is  a  terrible  villain.  He  has  decoyed  you 
from  your  home  and  tired  of  you;  he  has  put  you  on  the 
street  and  made  a  drug  fiend  of  you,  and  now  you  have  seen 
him  with  another  girl,  and  you  plead  with  him  not  to  desert 
you;  he  laughs  at  you;  you  turn  on  him  like  a  tigress  and, 
when  he  goes  on  laughing,  you  creep  up  on  him  with  a  false 
smile  and  suddenly  shoot  him  with  this  pistol." 

The  novice  stared  at  him  like  a  dumb  thing  that  had  not 
understood  a  word.  She  looked  at  the  screw  driver.  It 
had  no  resemblance  to  a  pistol,  and  if  it  had  suggested  one 
she  would  have  dropped  it  in  horror.  She  stared  at  the  pile 
of  yellow  canvas  and  could  get  nothing  human  out  of  or 
into  that. 

"I  don't  believe  I  quite  understand,"  she  faltered,  sud- 


SOULS    FOR   SALE  229 

denly  reverted  to  childhood  days  when  she  was  asked  to 
read  a  page  she  had  neglected  to  study. 

Claymore  missed  the  instant  result  of  his  first  appeal — 
to  her  imagination,  as  he  thought;  to  her  memory,  as  she 
knew.  Her  eyes  were  a  fogged  mirror  now  and  gave  back 
neither  light  nor  image. 

He  played  the  bit  for  her.  None  of  the  spectators  thought 
it  funny  or  silly.  It  was  part  of  the  familiar  routine  factory 
commonplace  to  see  a  fat,  bald-headed  director  striding 
about,  clutching  his  heart  and  sobbing. 

Mem  had  hidden  in  her  father's  study  once  and  watched 
him  rehearse  a  sermon,  had  seen  him  beat  his  desk  for  a 
pulpit,  raise  his  streaming  eyes  to  the  ceiling  for  heaven, 
and  repeat  phrases  in  various  intonations  in  search  of  the 
most  effective  stop. 

She  was  not  amused  or  disgusted  by  Claymore's  antics. 
She  was  simply  baffled.  Unable  to  feel  why  he  did  what  he 
did,  she  tried  to  remember  his  actions. 

When  he  finished  she  took  the  screw  driver  and  repeated 
his  gestures  with  neither  accuracy  nor  spirit.  She  merely 
gave  a  girl's  poor  imitation  of  a  man's  poor  imitation  of  a 
poor  girl's  frenzy. 

She  shook  her  head  in  confessed  failure  before  Claymore 
shook  his  head  and  scratched  it  and  said,  patiently: 

"  That's  hardly  it.  You  didn't  quite  get  the  spirit.  You 
see  you're  a" — etc.,  da  capo  alfine. 

The  camera  man  sat  down.  The  rest  of  the  crew  turned 
aside  to  gossip  about  more  interesting  topics.  They  knew 
that  they  were  in  for  a  long  wait. 


CHAPTER  XXXIII 

CLAYMORE  wrestled  with  the  girl's  flaccid  soul.  He 
V_>  walked  her  through  the  scene  again  and  again.  He 
sat  on  the  chair  and  pretended  to  be  the  villain.  He  laughed 
with  very  hollow  mockery.  He  played  the  part  himself. 
He  said: 

"It  you'll  give  it  more  voice  you'll  give  it  more  spirit. 
Call  me  a  beast  with  all  your  power!" 

"You're  a  beast!"  she  faltered  so  feebly  that  Claymore 
laughed  and  she  had  to  join  him.  He  said  to  her,  ''Look 
tn.e  in  the  eye  and  with  all  the  venom  and  volume  you've 
'got  snarl,  'Agh!  you  beast !": 

He  roared  it  so  full-chestedly  at  Mem  that  she  quailed 
before  him.  Then  she  nodded,  understanding,  and  gave 
back  the  words.  It  was  like  an  oboe  trying  to  echo  a  trom 
bone.  She  shook  her  head  in  discouragement.  He  would 
not  give  her  up. 

"Fill  your  lungs  and  hurl  your  whole  body  into  it!" 

She  tried  again  and  again,  but  her  voice  was  stringy, 
stinted,  reedish.  He  spoke  bluntly,  in  good  old  English: 

"You've  got  to  get  your  guts  into  it!" 

She  did  not  know  that  she  had  any,  and  he  had  to  explain 
that  he  really  meant  her  diaphragm. 

He  asked  her  to  scream  at  the  top  of  her  lungs.  She 
emitted  a  feeble  squawk.  He  shook  his  head.  He  let  out 
a  shriek  of  his  own  that  pierced  the  high  rafters  and  seemed 
to  rattle  the  glass  roof.  She  did  a  little  better  on  a  second 
try.  Claymore's  patience  was  wonderful.  "What  are  you 
most  afraid  of?"  he  said. 

"I  don't  know,"  she  giggled,  sillily. 

"What's  your  favorite  nightmare?" 

She  pondered.     "Well,  I— I- 

"  Falling  off  a  cliff  is  one  of  the  most  popular,"  said  Clay 
more. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  231 

"I  fell  off  a  cliff  once,"  said  Mem,  almost  boastfully. 

"Really!  And  did  you  survive?"  Claymore  gasped,  then 
grinned  at  his  own  imbecility.  "I  know  one  actress  who 
dreams  that  she  is  caught  under  a  wrecked  automobile  and 
can't  get  out  and  is  being  crushed  to  death." 

To  Claymore's  amazement  the  blank  mien  before  him 
was  suddenly  shot  through  with  anguish,  the  features 
knotted  and  whitened  with  streaks  of  red  like  a  clenched  fist. 

Once  more  he  had  thrust  his  hand  into  one  of  her  experi 
ences.  She  felt  the  presence  of  Elwood  Farnaby,  her  almost 
forgotten  first  love,  and  last.  The  ghastliness  of  his  death 
under  a  runaway  automobile  flashed  back  before  her.  She 
felt  a  regurgitation  of  all  the  terrors  that  had  churned  in 
her  heart  in  those  hideous  days  and  nights. 

Claymore,  never  dreaming  what  the  random  hint  had 
evoked  in  her  soul,  was  happy  at  finding  her  responsive  once 
more.  He  called  to  the  camera  man: 

"Come  on,  Johnny,  we'll  take  a  close-up,  a  big  close-up! 
Be  as  quick  as  you  can." 

While  Mem  hung  back  saying:  "Please!  No,  no!  I 
couldn't!  Don't  make  me!"  Claymore  was  hurrying  the 
crew  to  seize  this  precious  excitement  before  it  died. 

The  crew  closed  in  upon  the  camera  with  a  mass  of  blazing 
lights.  Claymore  pushed  a  chair  close  up  to  the  lens.  The 
camera  man  spread  and  shortened  his  tripod  and  got  on  his 
knees.  He  made  one  of  the  crew  sit  in  the  chair  while  he 
sharpened  the  focus  and  perfected  the  lights.  He  did  not 
want  to  fatigue  the  priceless  heights  of  agitation  that  he 
could  see  in  Mem's  wide  eyes  as  she  stood  wavering  before 
the  sudden  gust  of  emotion. 

Protesting  and  reluctant,  yet  too  palsied  for  flight,  Mem 
permitted  Claymore  to  lead  her  to  the  chair  and  place  her 
in  a  cowering  position. 

"Close  your  eyes,  to  save  them,"  he  said.  "Don't  open 
them  till  I  tell  you  to.  Then  open  them  suddenly  and  see 
the  automobile  upon  you.  It's  on  fire.  You  can't  move. 
You  struggle  in  vain.  I'll  hold  on  to  your  hands  to  pinion 
you  down.  When  you  see  that  you  are  crushed  and  caught, 
give  me  the  wildest  cry  you  can  scream !  All  ready,  Johnny  ? 


232  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

Hit  the  lights!  Take  the  camera  from  my  nod.  Now,  my 
dear,  you're  in  the  car,  the  brake  is  broken!  It's  dashing 
over  a  cliff!  It's  turned  over!  You  are  under  it!  It's  on 
fire!  When  I  say  the  word  open  your  eyes  and  face  death 
and  die  with  one  terrible  shriek!" 

She  felt  through  her  clenched  eyelids  and  on  her  shivering 
cheeks  the  flare  and  heat  of  the  focused  calciums.  She  felt 
his  hands  dragging  her  helpless  wrists  down  till  she  was  all 
huddled  upon  herself.  She  seemed  to  feel  in  his  taut  and 
frenzied  grip  the  weight  of  the  engine  that  had  slain  her 
lover.  Then  she  heard  the  quick  word, ' '  Now ! ' '  She  opened 
her  eyes  and  saw  a  chaos  of  wrecked  iron  and  steel  about 
her.  Terror  knifed  her  and  her  whole  body  was  wrung  with 
a  mad  howl  of  affright. 

She  heard  her  voice  go  leaping  into  the  high  spaces.  Her 
hands  were  free.  They  went  to  her  left  side  where  her  heart 
rocked  like  a  fire  bell.  She  opened  her  eyes  in  wonder.  The 
lights  were  off.  The  crew  was  staring  at  her  with  white 
faces.  The  camera  man  was  breathing  fast.  Claymore  was 
mopping  his  blenched  brow  and  saying,  "Whew!" 

It  was  so  inadequate  a  word  for  the  awe  still  shaking  their 
little  world,  that  everybody  laughed — but  sickishly. 

Claymore  brought  forth  his  most  valued  word  saved  for 
rare  occasions. 

"By  God!  that  was  authentic!" 

And  the  others  said,  "The  real  thing!" — a  strange  phrase 
for  a  perfection  of  imitation. 

Claymore  was  encouraged  again.  He  had  found  another 
nugget  in  the  rubble.  He  would  continue  to  work  the  mine. 

If  he  had  known  Mem's  life  and  the  things  she  had  experi 
enced,  few  but  fearful,  he  could  have  brought  forth  expres 
sions  of  intense  amorous  possession,  of  desperate  surrender, 
of  groveling  shame,  of  mad  grief,  of  craven  hypocrisy.  But 
he  groped  in  ignorance  and  did  not  realize  that  her  two 
successes  had  been  due  to  memory  rather  than  interpretation. 

Another  failure  trailed  at  heel  of  this  other  victory.  Clay 
more  returned  to  his  little  drama  of  the  street.  He  tried  to 
get  energy  in  a  gesture,  in  a  walk,  a  stride,  a  quick  whirl, 
a  flaunt  of  arms,  a  fierce  charge. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  233 

But  Mem  had  been  schooled  all  her  life  to  keep  her  hands 
down  and  to  avoid  flourish,  to  take  short  steps  and  to  keep 
her  waist  and  hips  stolid.  Though  the  fashions  of  the  day 
gave  her  short,  loose  skirts,  no  corsets,  free  arms,  she  might 
as  well  have  been  handcuffed  and  hobbled  and  fastened  in 
iron  stays,  for  all  the  freedom  she  used. 

Claymore  made  her  run,  with  longer  and  longer  stride, 
bend  and  touch  the  floor,  fling  her  arms  aloft,  take  the  steps 
of  a  Spanish  dancer  and  a  Spanish  vixen.  But  she  was 
unbelievably  inept. 

"I  wish  I  had  the  courage  and  the  kindliness  to  give  you 
a  Belasco  training,"  he  said.  "You  know  he  testified  in 
court  that  when  he  trained  Mrs.  Leslie  Carter  for  her  big 
war-horse  roles,  he  had  to  break  her  muscle-bound  condition 
first.  He  threw  her  down  stairs,  throttled  her,  beat  her  head 
against  the  wall,  and  chased  her  about  the  room.  She  told 
me  herself  that  she  learned  the  Declaration  of  Independence 
by  heart  and  spent  hours  and  hours  repeating  it.  as  glibly  as 
she  could.  Every  time  she  missed  an  articulation  she  went 
back  to  the  beginning  and  recited  it  all  over  again — hundreds 
and  hundreds  of  times.  That's  how  she  learned  to  deliver 
great  tirades  with  a  breathless  rush,  yet  made  every  syllable 
distinct.  That's  how  she  learned  how  to  charge  about  the 
stage  like  a  lioness. 

"  To  be  a  great  actress  is  no  easy  job.  You've  got  to  work 
like  a  fiend  or  you'll  get  nowhere.  You've  got  to  exercise 
your  arms  and  legs  and  your  voice  and  your  soul.  If  you 
will,  you've  got  a  big  future.  If  you  won't  you'll  slump 
along  playing  small  parts  till  you  lose  your  bloom  of  youth, 
then  you'll  slip  into  character  parts  and  go  out  like  an  old 
candle." 

Mem  was  beginning  to  wear  down,  to  understand  the 
joys  of  a  pleasant  housewifely  career,  the  luxuries  of 
obscurity. 

But  Claymore  hated  to  give  her  up.  He  made  one  more 
desperate  effort  to  unleash  her  soul  and  her  body  from  the 
shackles  of  respectability. 

He  set  her  to  denouncing  the  tarpaulin  villain  again.    He 

made  her  pour  out  before  that  heap  of  wrinkles  a  story  of 
16 


234  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

shame  and  disprized  devotion  and  degradation.  He  put  her 
against  the  wall  and  made  her  beat  upon  it  and  lament  her 
turpitude.  He  made  her  fling  herself  to  the  floor  and  pound 
it  with  her  fists  and  laugh  in  mockery.  Then  he  made  her 
draw  the  screw  driver  and  fire  five  shots  into  her  canvas 
betrayer. 

Her  imagination  flagged  so  dismally  in  this  scene  that  he 
decreed  the  screw  driver  a  stiletto  and  made  her  stab  the 
man  to  death.  He  laughed  at  the  blow  she  dealt  and  forced 
her  to  slash  and  rip  and  drive  the  blade  home  until  she  fell 
down  exhausted  with  the  vain  effort  to  be  a  murderess. 

Claymore  was  as  exhausted  as  she  and  he  wasted  no  film 
on  taking  pictures  of  her  failure. 

"Let's  go  to  lunch!"  he  said.  "We've  earned  a  bit  of 
chow." 


CHAPTER  XXXIV 

HTHE  upshot  of  this  ordeal  by  fire  was  that  Mem  was 
1  recognized  as  a  star  yet  to  be  made — if,  indeed,  her 
nebulous  ambitions  should  ever  be  condensed  into  solid 
achievement. 

Claymore  felt  that  she  had  a  future.  He  told  her  so. 
But  he  told  her  that  a  period  of  hard  labor  lay  between  her 
and  that  paradise.  He  compared  the  development  of  an 
artist  with  the  slow  human  miracle  that  had  rescued  so  much 
of  California  from  the  grim  bleakness  of  the  desert,  the  desert 
that  yields  and  reconquers,  retreats  and  returns. 

Great  reaches  of  the  fairest  home  realm  of  Los  Angeles 
had  once  been  barren  sand.  Irrigation  and  intensive  farm 
ing  had  made  a  pleasaunce  of  it  and  one  could  see  everywhere 
the  industry  of  the  little  pioneers  pushing  the  wasteland 
back,  as  if  humanity  were  feeling  its  way  like  a  shapeless 
amceba  or  a  groping  vine  putting  its  tentacles  forth  and 
fastening  them  wherever  sustenance  might  be  found. 

Claymore  was  one  of  those  developers  of  talent  who  feel  a 
passion  for  searching  out  gold  where  it  lies,  building  roads, 
as  it  were,  to  hidden  hearts  and  giving  them  expression, 
making  a  traffic  and  commerce  of  expression. 

He  found  in  Mem  such  a  temptation.  Her  beauty  was 
evident,  but  empty-faced  beauty  was  as  cheap  and  useless 
as  iron  pyrites  with  the  glister  of  gold  and  no  other  value. 

The  studios  were  infested  with  pink  pretties,  insipid  and 
characterless,  doomed  to  hold  up  faces  as  faultless  and  as 
charmless  as  the  petunias  and  morning-glories  that  flaunt 
their  calico  in  vain  about  country  gardens  and  porches. 

In  Mem  he  felt  the  ore.  He  did  not  know  that  it  had  gone 
through  the  smelting  fires  of  tragedy,  but  he  felt  that  she 
was  capable  of  tragedy,  and  he  wanted  to  instruct  her  in 
the  mechanisms  of  transmitted  grief. 


236  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

As  they  left  the  stage  he  watched  her  out  of  the  corner  of 
his  eye.  She  did  not  really  know  how  to  walk,  though  there 
was  unconscious  grace  in  her  carriage.  What  he  wanted 
was  conscious  grace  expert  enough  to  mask  its  understanding, 
the  art  that  conceals  art  and  knows  its  genius  all  the  while — 
the  deft,  strong  hand  of  the  driver  of  a  trotting  horse  who 
gets  the  ultimate  speed  from  the  racing  machine  without 
ever  letting  it  break  into  a  gallop  or  bolt  into  a  mad  run. 

Claymore  talked  to  Mem  of  herself  and  her  body  as  frankly 
as  a  father  confessor  dissects  a  soul  before  a  believer's  eyes. 
She  was  thrilled  with  the  almost  morbid  sensation  of  being 
the  subject  of  such  remorseless  analysis.  She  was  like  one 
of  the  victims  of  the  new-fashioned  operations  by  local 
anaesthesia  who  sits  up  and  in  a  mood  of  hysterical  fascina 
tion  chats  with  the  surgeon  even  while  he  slashes  the  skin 
open,  lays  bare  the  nerves  and  arteries,  discloses  the  deep 
penetralia  of  the  temple. 

The  director  asked  her  if  she  would  practice  at  home  what 
he  had  told  her  and  shown  her  on  the  stage,  and  then  some 
day  let  him  give  her  another  test. 

She  consented  with  delight,  and  appointed  the  morrow 
as  the  nearest  day  there  was.  She  had  only  one  somber 
thought — that  she  must  go  home  again  without  a  promise 
of  work,  with  neither  income  of  money  nor  outgo  of  art 
to  expect. 

But  Claymore  asked  her  to  wait  while  he  spoke  to  Mr. 
Bermond.  She  loitered  on  the  green  lawn,  watching  the 
made-up  actors  and  the  extra  people  and  the  others 
moving  about  their  tasks.  Some  day  they  must  gaze  at 
her  with  respect  and  whisper,  "That's  Miss  Steddon,  the 
great  star." 

By  and  by  Mr.  Bermond  came  out  bareheaded  to  see  her. 
He  had  a  way  of  meeting  candidates  out  of  doors.  It  was 
easier  to  remember  an  engagement  and  dash  away,  than  to 
pry  the  more  tenacious  ones  out  of  his  office  chairs. 

Bermond  shook  Mem's  hand  warmly  and  said,  with  as 
much  enthusiasm  as  if  he  were  the  beneficiary  of  her  hopes 
— as  of  course  he  might  be : 

4 'Well,  Mr.   Claymore  tells  me  you  have  much  talent. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  237 

That's  fine!  But  he  says  your  work  is  spotty — immature. 
You  have  little  technic.  But  that's  all  right.  Everybody 
has  to  learn.  He  has  a  small  part  in  his  picture,  and  if  you 
want  to  take  it,  all  right.  The  part  won't  stand  much 
money,  but  you  will  get  experience  and  that's  what  you 
want,  yes?" 

Mem  could  have  hugged  him.  He  was  beautiful  as  the 
dawning  sun  on  the  hills  of  night.  Later  she  would  come 
to  hate  him  and  fight  him  as  a  miser,  a  penny  squeezer,  a 
slave  driver,  but  so  Christopher  Columbus  and  Cortes 
were  regarded  after  their  brief  moments  of  beauty  as  dis 
coverers. 

Bermond  was  a  believer  in  "new  faces."  He  had  found 
that  the  audiences  would  forgive  immaturity  of  art  rather 
than  maturity  of  figure  when  it  had  to  choose.  The  part  he 
offered  Mem  was  a  role  of  girlish  pathos  with  a  wistful 
note  and  a  few  moments  of  village  tragedy.  She  would  adorn 
the  screen  without  being  able  to  do  much  damage  to  the 
story  at  worst. 

Mem  felt  that  in  passing  from  director  to  director  she 
was  undergoing  a  series  of  spiritual  marriages  and  divorces. 
There  were  such  intense  emotional  communions  that  it  was 
far  more  than  a  mere  acquaintance. 

But  before  she  left  the  lot  that  day  she  had  signed  her 
name  to  a  long  document  which  she  pretended  to  read  and 
understand.  About  all  she  made  of  it  was  that  she  was  to 
have  a  salary  of  seventy-five  dollars  a  week  during  the 
taking  of  the  picture,  and  that  the  company  might  exercise 
an  option  on  her  services  thereafter  if  it  chose. 

Mr.  Tirrey  was  delighted  in  a  paternal  fashion.  It  was  a 
sunbeam  in  his  dark  day  when  he  could  open  the  door  to 
youth  and  hope. 

Mem  went  home  elated,  and  was  greeted  so  royally  that 
she  forgot  how  diminished  her  hopes  were  from  the  immediate 
stardom  she  had  imagined  under  Claymore's  first  frenzy. 

The  next  day  the  star  of  the  picture  arrived  on  the  set 
in  a  large  hat.  When  Claymore  told  her  that  she  was  not 
to  wear  it  during  the  scene  she  exclaimed  that  her  hair  was 
not  dressed. 


238  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

There  was  nothing  to  do  but  send  her  to  the  coiffeuse. 
This  meant  a  delay  of  an  hour.  The  company  and  the 
throng  of  extras  and  the  crew  must  lie  idle  at  the  cost  of 
nearly  a  thousand  wasted  dollars  to  the  picture 

It  was  with  such  unavoidable  blunders  that  Bermond's 
cup  of  grief  was  filled.  No  system  of  efficiency  could  be 
installed  to  prevent  the  individual  slip.  An  alarm  clock 
that  failed  to  ring,  a  telephone  out  of  order,  a  letter  mis 
addressed,  and  thousands  of  dollars  of  time  and  overhead 
went  pouff! 

The  company's  disaster  was  Mem's  good  luck,  for  Clay 
more,  seeing  her  lurking  in  the  background  waiting  for 
instructions,  called  her  over  to  him. 

Everything  was  set  for  a  test  and  he  dismissed  the  rest  of 
the  company  for  an  early  lunch,  while  he  sent  Mem  through 
her  paces  again. 

He  had  a  canvas  partition  drawn  round  a  corner  of  the 
scene  and  once  more  put  Mem  at  bay  against  a  wall  with  a 
camera  and  a  nest  of  light  machines  leveled  at  her. 

She  had  spent  the  evening  before  at  mad  spiritual  gym 
nastics  in  the  bungalow,  with  her  mother  and  Leva  as  audi 
ence  and  critics.  Claymore  found  that  her  soul  was  waken 
ing  and  her  limbs  throwing  off  their  inertia.  He  set  her 
problems  in  mental  arithmetic  like  a  tutor  coaching  a  back 
ward  pupil  for  an  examination. 

It  was  an  exceedingly  curious  method  of  getting 
acquainted.  Teacher  and  student  became  as  much  involved 
in  each  other's  souls  as  Abelard  and  Heloise  at  their  first 
sessions. 

When  the  star  came  back  with  her  hair  appropriately 
laundered,  ironed,  and  crimped,  and  the  rest  of  the  company 
gathered,  Mem  could  see  that  Claymore  gave  up  his  task 
with  her  reluctantly.  And  that  sent  a  shaft  of  sweet  fire 
through  her  heart. 

Late  in  the  afternoon  Claymore  offered  her  a  lift  home  in 
his  automobile.  It  was  quicker  than  the  street  car,  but  it 
seemed  far  quicker  than  that.  They  chattered  volubly  of 
art  theories  and  practices.  They  did  not  realize  how  long 
the  car  stood  in  front  of  her  bungalow  before  Mem  got  out, 


SOULS   FOR   SALE  239 

or  how  long  he  waited  after  she  got  out,  talking,  talking, 
before  he  bade  her  the  final  good  night. 

Her  mother  realized  it,  peering  through  the  curtains, 
and  Leva  exclaimed: 

"Good  Lord!  The  minx  has  the  director  eating  out  of 
her  hand  already.  She'll  get  on!" 

She  said  this  to  Mem  when  the  girl  came  skipping  into 
the  house,  and  shocked  her  with  a  glimpse  of  how  their  high 
spiritual  relations  looked  to  the  bystander. 

Leva  taunted  her  all  evening,  and  the  next  morning  called 
after  her,  as  she  set  out  to  school : 

"Aren't  you  going  to  take  a  big  red  apple  to  teacher?" 

Mem  took  him  two  of  them  in  her  crimson  cheeks. 

She  had  met  none  of  that  traditional  demand  for  her 
honor  as  an  admittance  fee  to  the  art.  Tirrey  had  refused 
her  flat.  Bermond  had  not  invited  her  to  love  him,  and 
Claymore  had  talked  nothing  but  art.  Yet  Claymore  occa 
sionally  gave  her  a  scene  with  an  actor  as  a  foil,  talked  to 
her  of  the  arts  of  embracing,  kissing,  fondling,  rebuking, 
accepting,  denouncing,  battling. 

But  sometimes  he  seemed  to  take  more  than  a  profes 
sional  interest  in  the  demonstrations.  Sometimes  he  drew 
her  arms  about  himself,  and  she  felt  that  even  if  he  did  not 
clench  her  tight  or  hold  her  long,  he  wanted  to. 

The  camera  men,  the  dawdling  light  crew,  and  the  props 
and  frips  were  chaperons,  but  they  were  becoming  as  unim 
portant  as  the  scenery.  Sometimes  she  thought  they  were 
aware  of  a  something  in  the  atmosphere.  Perhaps  she 
caught  a  glance  shot  from  one  to  another,  or  an  eye  turned 
away  a  little  too  indifferently. 

But  that  only  enhanced  the  excitement,  and  on  one 
occasion  when  Claymore  tried  to  teach  her  bigness  of  wrath 
and  compelled  her  to  scream  and  strike  at  him,  there  was 
such  an  undertone  of  affection  in  the  pretense  of  hate  that 
she  felt  fairly  wrenched  apart. 

She  met  Tom  Holby  on  the  lot  one  day.  He  had  been 
asked  to  come  over  and  talk  of  a  possible  contract  with  the 
Bermond  Company.  He  greeted  Mem  with  effusive  enthusi 
asm,  and  she  warmed  at  the  pride  of  his  recognition.  Then 


240  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

she  felt  a  little  twinge  of  conscience — an  intuition  that  she 
had  no  right  to  be  so  glad  to  see  Mr.  Holby,  since  now  she 
belonged  to  Mr.  Claymore. 

This  was  an  amazing  and  slavish  reversion  to  primeval 
submissiveness  for  an  emancipated  woman.  But  there  was 
a  tang  of  wild  comfort  in  the  feeling  that  she  was  owned. 
And  then  she  wondered  if  she  did  not  owe  the  priority  to 
Mr.  Holby.  This  was  a  complication ! 

It  is  the  custom  to  regard  such  confused  romances  in  the 
dramatic  and  other  artistic  realms  with  scorn  as  the  flippant 
amours  of  triflers;  but  they  are  of  exactly  the  same  sort, 
as  earnest,  as  pathetic  and  as  reluctantly  entered  into  as 
the  countless  entanglements  that  doctors  and  churchmen 
encounter  in  their  equally  emotional  relations  with  souls  in 
turmoil  of  one  sort  or  another. 

Literature  used  to  be  packed  with  the  disastrous  affairs 
of  churchmen  and  their  communicants,  but  the  silence  has 
been  profound  of  late,  except  when  a  sensational  explosion 
bursts  into  the  newspapers.  And  there  has  been  little  dis 
closure  at  any  time  of  the  secret  chambers  to  which  the 
physician's  passe-partout  admits  him. 

The  stage  and  the  painter's  world  have  had  too  much 
attention  and  too  little  sympathy,  and  shortly  the  moving 
picture  was  to  be  assailed  by  a  tornado  of  national  disgust 
and  wrath,  an  eruption  of  hot  ashes  and  lava  from  a  deep 
resentment  stored  up  unknown  against  the  magic  develop 
ment  of  the  new  art  into  Titanic  power. 

But  no  one  foresaw  the  accident  that  was  to  turn  a  com 
monplace  carousal  into  a  cataclysm. 

For  the  present  Mem  had  no  greater  anxiety  than  the 
peculiarly  masked  flirtation  with  her  director  and  the  battles 
with  little  artistic  problems  as  they  arose. 

Her  life  had  regularity  again.  She  got  up  of  mornings 
with  a  task  before  her.  She  had  hours  of  waiting  for  every 
minute  of  acting,  but  she  was  one  of  the  company  and  she 
could  study  the  work  of  others.  Her  textbooks  were  the 
faces  of  the  actors  and  actresses,  the  directions  of  the 
directors. 

The  mere  learning  of  the  language  was  an  occupation  in 


SOULS    FOR   SALE  241 

itself.  She  felt  puffed  up  when  visitors  were  brought  upon 
the  stage  and  permitted  to  see  pictures  taken. 

It  was  surprising  how  fascinating  the  thing  was  to  the 
outsiders.  Kings  and  queens,  princesses  and  princes,  foreign 
and  native  generals,  ambassadors,  opera  singers,  plutocrats, 
painters,  gathered  humbly  in  the  backgrounds  of  the  scenes 
and  marveled  at  the  business  of  drama  and  photography, 
the  morbid  blue  lights  and  the  surprising  calm  and  gracious- 
ness  of  the  process.  They  had  evidently  expected  noise 
and  wrangling  and  tempestuous  temperament. 

One  day  when  a  little  scene  was  being  filmed  in  which  she 
was  the  only  actress,  the  rest  of  the  company  being  excused 
for  a  change  of  costume,  a  visitor  from  overseas  was  brought 
upon  the  set,  a  great  French  general. 

The  publicity  man,  whose  lust  for  space  never  slept, 
suggested  that  the  general  might  like  to  be  photographed 
on  the  scene.  He  laughed  and  came  forward  with  a  boyish 
eagerness.  He  displayed  at  once  a  terror  he  had  not  revealed 
under  bombardment.  On  one  side  of  him  stood  the  director, 
on  the  other  Mem,  thrilled  and  thrilling. 

The  still  camera  man  took  several  pictures  and  the  in 
cident  was  ended,  it  seemed.  The  general  kissed  Mem's 
hand  and  left  her  almost  aswoon  with  pride.  The  publicity 
man  gave  her  one  of  the  pictures  and  she  set  it  up  on  her 
mantel  as  a  trophy  of  her  glory. 

Whether  the  general  really  said  it  or  really  meant  it,  only 
the  publicity  man  knew,  but  when  the  picture  appeared  in 
newspaper  supplements  about  the  world  it  was  stated  in 
each  of  the  captions  that  the  great  warrior  had  said,  "Remem 
ber  Steddon  is  the  prettiest  girl  in  America." 

More  amazing  yet,  Mem  first  learned  of  this  astounding 
tribute  from  her  astounded  father. 

Soon  after  she  began  to  feel  a  pride  in  her  art  and  to  take 
home  to  her  mother  little  compliments  she  had  heard,  and 
to  feel  that  she  was  launched  at  last  upon  the  illimitable  sea 
of  the  greatest,  as  the  newest,  of  arts,  and  the  most  superb 
of  all  livelihoods,  the  storm  broke  upon  the  moving-picture 
world. 

An  actor  involved  in  a  dull  revel,  of  a  sort  infinitely  fre- 


242  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

quent  since  mankind  first  encountered  alcohol,  was  present 
at  the  death  of  an  actress.  The  first  versions  of  the  disaster 
were  so  horribly  garbled  that  the  nation  was  shaken  with 
horror. 

All  the  simmering  resentment  against  the  evil  elements 
and  ugly  excesses  of  the  "fifth  largest  industry  in  the  world" 
boiled  over  in  a  scalding  denunciation  of  the  entire  motion- 
picture  populace. 

For  a  week  or  two  the  nation  rose  in  one  mob  to  lynch  an 
entire  craft  and  all  its  folk.  Editors,  politicians,  reformers, 
preachers,  clubwomen,  all  of  those  who  make  a  career  of 
denunciation  and  take  a  pride  in  what  they  detest,  drew  up 
a  blanket  indictment  against  thousands  of  assorted  souls 
and  condemned  them  to  infamy. 

Doctor  Steddon  had  been  one  of  the  loyal  leathers  of  the 
moving  pictures,  and  he  surprised  himself  in  the  jeremiad 
he  launched  at  his  little  congregation  back  in  Calverly.  A 
newspaper  man  happened  to  be  present — the  rain  that 
morning  denying  him  his  usual  worship  on  the  golf  links — 
and  he  published  a  column  of  Doctor  Steddon's  remarks. 

The  proud  father  sent  a  clipping  to  his  wife  and  daughter, 
never  dreaming  that  the  moving  pictures  were  furnishing 
them  their  bread  and  butter,  boots  and  beatitudes. 

They  cowered  before  the  blast  and  understood  the  emo 
tions  of  Adam  and  Eve  after  they  had  eaten  of  the  tree  of 
knowledge  and  heard  the  Voice  in  the  garden. 

They  debated  the  hateful  problem  of  confessing  the 
truth,  but  could  not  bring  themselves  yet  awhile  to  the 
disclosure  of  their  fraud. 

And  then  a  letter  came  from  the  man  they  loved  and 
dreaded.  As  Mrs.  Steddon's  fingers  opened  the  envelope 
in  the  awkwardness  of  guilt,  two  pictures  fell  to  the  floor. 
They  were  in  the  brown  rotogravure  of  the  Sunday  supple 
ments.  They  were  alike  except  in  size;  one  was  from  the 
New  York  Times  and  one  from  the  Chicago  Tribune.  Both 
presented  Mem  standing  at  the  side  of  the  French  general. 
Both  stated  that  he  had  called  this  promising  member  of 
the  Bermond  Company  "the  prettiest  girl  in  America." 

Mem  and  her  mother  gathered  themselves  together  as  if 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  243 

they  had  been  dazed  by  a  rip  of  lightning  from  the  blue  and 
waited  for  the  thunderbolt  to  smash  the  world  about  them. 
They  read  the  letter  together.  It  began  without  any  "  Dear 
Wife"  or  "Dear  Daughter."  It  began: 

The  inclosed  clippings  were  sent  to  me  by  members  of  my  con 
gregation  who  were  sojourning,  one  in  New  York  and  one  in  Chicago. 
It  is  hard  for  me  to  doubt  the  witness  of  my  eyes,  but  it  is  almost 
harder  to  believe  that  the  wife  of  my  bosom  and  the  daughter 
reared  in  the  shelter  of  our  home  could  have  fallen  so  low  so  sud 
denly.  Before  I  write  more  I  want  to  hear  the  truth  from  both  of 
you,  if  you  can  and  will  tell  it. 


CHAPTER  XXXV 

THE  Reverend  Doctor  Steddon  was  something  more  than 
a  father  to  his  daughter,  something  more  than  a  hus 
band  to  his  wife;  he  was  also  the  high  priest  of  their  religion. 

The  daughter  had  fled  from  his  face  after  her  sin,  and  had 
found  a  new  paradise,  a  new  priestcraft,  a  new  religion  beyond 
the  desert.  She  had  come  to  believe  in  an  artist  God,  loving 
beauty  and  emotion  and  inspiring  his  true  believers  to 
proclaim  his  glories  through  the  development  and  celebra 
tion  of  the  gifts  and  graces  he  had  bestowed.  She  felt  that 
he  required  of  her  hymns  of  passionate  worship  instead  of 
the  quenching  of  her  spirit,  the  distortion  of  her  graces,  the 
burial  of  her  genius.  The  Mosaic  Ten  Commandments 
contained  no  "Thou  shalt  not  commit  dramaturgy."  She 
felt  a  consecration,  a  call  to  act,  to  interpret  humanity  to 
humanity.  What  her  father  had  deemed  temptations  and 
degradations  she  now  considered  inspirations  and  triumphs. 

And  yet  she  could  not  feel  quite  sure  of  herself.  High  as 
she  might  rate  her  career,  she  had  come  at  it  by  stealth  and 
had  been  led  to  it  by  a  dark  path  of  lies  and  of  concealed 
shame.  The  overseeing  heaven  and  the  pit  of  hell  yawning 
for  unwary  feet  still  terrified  her. 

Her  mother  had  a  different  excuse;  she  had  come  hither 
to  protect  her  daughter  and  redeem  her  from  calamity. 
Her  deception  had  been  a  form  of  protection.  What  if  she 
had  deceived  her  husband?  it  was  all  for  his  comfort,  and 
she  had  never  sought  her  own.  If  one  may  die  for  another's 
sake,  why  may  one  not  lie  in  an  alien  behalf? 

Besides,  Mrs.  Steddon  had  grown  up  with  her  husband 
and  had  seen  his  tempers  goad  him  to  too  many  mistakes. 
She  was  merely  angry  at  him  now  for  a  burst  of  wrath,  while 
Mem  cowered  before  him  as  an  inspired  prophet. 

Mrs.  Steddon  was  all  for  retorting  to  his  letter  with  another 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  245 

of  defiant  rebuke.  But  Mem  advised  delay.  She  was  not 
quite  sure  of  herself  or  her  art. 

Torments  of  doubt,  conflicting  remorses,  profound  bewil 
derments  are  no  more  familiar  to  religious  zealots  than  to 
artists  in  every  field.  And  Mem  could  not  orient  herself 
in  her  new  world 

But  she  would  not  give  up  her  career.  That  much  was 
certain.  She  had  drained  the  family  savings  already  for 
her  mother's  overland  journey  and  her  own.  She  must 
earn  enough  to  pay  back  the  draft  somehow;  and  here  was 
her  one  chance. 

Fifteen  dollars  a  week  was  all  that  her  veteran  father 
earned.  She  could  support  him  and  the  whole  family  better 
than  he  had  any  hope  of  doing.  She  was  the  true  bread 
winner  now,  and  she  must  not  quarrel  with  her  bread.  She 
had  a  warm  desire  to  take  her  father's  poor  old  gray  poll 
under  her  wing,  to  give  him  rest  from  his  long  toil  and 
repose  in  the  new  Eden,  almost  to  mother  him  and  nourish 
him  even  as  Lot's  daughters  had  nourished  their  father. 
But  she  could  imagine  the  horror  with  which  Doctor  Steddon 
would  be  thunderstruck  at  the  hint  that  he  should  step  down 
from  the  fiery  chariot  of  his  pulpit  and  bask  in  the  shadow 
of  a  motion-picture  actress.  The  letter  that  suggested  such 
a  thing  would  be  as  fatal  as  one  of  the  infernal  machines 
that  people  were  sending  through  the  mails  to  shatter 
the  recipient. 

Yet  she  could  never  give  up  her  career  and  go  back  to 
the  grave  of  Calverly.  It  was  too  wonderful  to  play  a  scene 
on  the  set,  to  revel  in  a  moment  of  dramatic  power,  throw 
out  a  tragic  gesture,  look  a  mute  appeal,  then,  next  day, 
to  sit  in  the  black  projection  room  and  hear  the  small  group 
of  witnesses  murmur  at  her  sorrow  and  praise  her  graces. 

This  precious  harvest  of  her  toil  was  too  dear  to  relin 
quish.  She  had  just  dropped  her  sickle  into  the  edge  of  the 
golden  wheat  and  she  must  go  on. 

On  the  evening  of  the  arrival  of  Doctor  Steddon's  letter 
two  callers  dropped  in — Claymore  and  Holby. 

The  subject  of  all  moving-picture  talk  was  still  the 
Arbuclde  case,  a  cause  celebre  that  monopolized  the  headlines 


246  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

of  the  newspapers  for  weeks,  especially  in  Los  Angeles,  where 
two  hostile  camps  were  formed  and  the  enemies  of  the 
free  film  took  new  heart  and  determined  to  chain  and  tarnc 
the  beast  once  for  all. 

"Woe  unto  the  world  because  it  must  needs  be  that 
offenses  come,  but  woe  unto  him  by  whom  the  offense 
cometh." 

Since  man  had  cumbered  the  ground  there  had  been 
hilarious  groups  and  drinking  bouts  of  more  or  less  gayety. 
They  had  been  called  festivals,  Bacchic  revels,  or  disgusting 
debauches,  according  as  a  poet  or  a  preacher  described 
them. 

After  the  prohibition  law  became  law  in  the  United  States 
the  enormous  amount  of  liquor  still  consumed,  the  appalling 
tidal  waves  of  crime,  had  been  matter  for  jokes  or  sermons 
or  hot  debates,  the  same  arguments  proving  opposite  con 
tentions  for  both  sides. 

On  a  certain  day  when  there  were  probably  ten  thousand 
similar  guzzling  coteries,  a  certain  moving-picture  comedian 
of  Falstaffian  girth  and  vast  popularity  entertained  in  his 
hotel  rooms  at  San  Francisco  a  number  of  men  and  women ; 
one  of  the  women  fell  ill  and  died  a  few  days  later  and 
another  woman  told  a  story  so  garbled  at  the  start  that  the 
nation  shuddered  with  the  pain  and  the  ugliness  of  it.  The 
story  was  soon  contradicted  in  almost  every  particular  by 
the  prime  witness  herself  and  by  all  the  other  confused  and 
confusing  witnesses.  But  the  tide  of  national  wrath  could 
not  be  recalled. 

An  ambitious  district  attorney  resolved  that  the  comedian 
should  be  tried  for  murder  in  the  first  degree.  Two  juries 
and  a  judge  declined  to  go  so  far  with  him,  but  the  pulpits 
and  the  editorial  columns,  the  legislative  halls  and  forums 
and  the  very  street  corners,  roared  with  a  demand  for  some 
body's  destruction. 

All  this  was  pitiful,  hateful,  lamentable — everything 
bewildering  and  depressing — but  it  was  also  very  common 
in  human  history.  The  same  avalanches  had  been  started 
by  a  whisper  and  had  engulfed  whole  races,  religions,  politi 
cal  parties,  reigning  families,  churches,  lodges,  charities 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  247 

— what  not? — just  as  now  the  entire  motion-picture  world 
was  smothered  in  a  welter  of  abuse  and  condemnation. 

With  all  the  logic  of  a  mob  reveling  in  a  chance  to  realize 
its  mob  lust,  it  was  assumed  or  pretended  that  there  was 
something  specifically  of  the  moving  pictures  in  the  affair 
at  San  Francisco. 

Drunkards,  bootleggers,  and  respectable  millions  who 
smuggled  liquor  into  their  homes  without  scruple  expressed 
horror  at  a  motion-picture  actor  for  having  liquor  in  his 
possession. 

The  cry  for  censorship  arose  with  renewed  fury,  and  there 
was  no  stopping  the  superstition  that  all  human  wickedness 
was  somehow  due  to  this  new  devil. 

By  a  coincidence,  while  this  one  motion-picture  clown  was 
drawing  all  the  lightnings  of  the  sky  upon  all  the  motion- 
picture  people,  the  churches  were  contributing  to  the  crim 
inal  courts  an  extraordinary  number  of  cases.  A  Protestant 
minister  in  Alabama  was  on  trial  for  beating  a  Catholic 
priest  to  death;  another  preacher  was  being  found  guilty 
of  drowning  his  wife  in  a  lake;  another  of  flogging  his  own 
child  to  death  for  unsatisfactory  prayers;  a  white-robed 
faith  healer  was  indicted  for  manslaughter  on  account  of  a 
pious  laying  on  of  hands  so  violent  that  an  elderly  patient 
died  in  an  agony  of  broken  bones;  the  next  most  spacious 
murder  case  of  the  day  was  charged  against  a  man  whose 
father  was  a  minister  and  whose  wife  was  the  daughter  of 
a  bishop. 

Yet  nobody  dreamed  of  assailing  religion  as  an  incentive 
to  murder;  no  one  warned  the  young  to  avoid  churches  or 
suggested  a  censorship  of  sermons. 

It  struck  nobody  as  ludicrous  or  contemptible  to  blame  a 
twenty-year-old  art  for  evils  that  had  flourished  during  ten 
thousand  years  of  recorded  wickedness. 

The  public  was  in  a  lynching  mood  and  would  not  be 
denied. 

A  whole  art  was  being  tarred  and  feathered  and  tortured 
in  every  cruel  and  fantastic  manner.  Bankers  withdrew 
money  from  companies  with  pictures  half  finished.  Audi 
ences  fell  away  in  the  picture  houses  everywhere.  The 


248  SOULS    FOR   SALE 

motion-picture  Goliath,  already  weakened  with  the  mal 
nutrition  of  hard  times,  staggered  under  a  shower  of  stones 
from  the  slings  of  myriad  Davids. 

While  they  lasted  those  were  dramatic  days  for  the  bright 
children  of  the  moving  pictures.  They  felt  like  gypsies 
riding  caroling  through  a  summer  landscape  and  suddenly 
assailed  by  farmers  with  pitchforks  and  abuse. 

The  newcomer,  Remember  Steddon,  was  especially 
aghast.  The  delectable  mountain  she  had  essayed  to  climb 
was  abruptly  fenced  off  as  a  peak  of  hell. 


CHAPTER  XXXVI 

DOCTOR  STEDDON  had  constantly  besought  from  his 
pulpit  forgiveness  for  his  flock's  woeful  sins  of  omission 
and  commission.  He  had  cried  to  heaven  that  his  people 
were  miserable  sinners  incessantly  backsliding  into  every 
wickedness.  Yet  it  was  somehow  different  when  a  motion- 
picture  player  growled,  as  Claymore  did  now,  "Well,  we  are 
rotten — rottener  than  any  outsider  knows — and  we're  only 
getting  what  was  coming  to  us." 

Claymore  was  always  the  apologist.  What  he  loved  he 
distrusted.  His  wife  had  left  him  on  that  account.  He  had 
felt  compelled  to  correct  her  faults  and  lovingly  chastise  her. 
He  had  been  a  director  in  the  theater  and  had  gone  about 
shamefaced  on  account  of  the  misbehavior  of  so  many  of 
its  people,  the  alleged  low  standards  of  the  successes,  the 
lack  of  appreciation  for  Shakespeare,  the  absence  of  a  true 
sense  of  art  in  all  Americans,  the  mysterious  genius  for  art 
in  all  foreigners. 

As  soon  as  he  had  been  decoyed  into  the  motion-picture 
field  the  theater  borrowed  enchantment  from  distance.  It 
was  as  noble  as  antiquity.  And  now  all  his  wailings  were 
against  the  trash  the  motion-picture  trade  turned  out  and 
its  base  commercialism  compared  with  the  lofty  accom 
plishments  of  the  theater. 

He  was  a  priest  at  an  altar,  but  he  always  praised  the 
elder  gods.  So  now  he  growled. 

"The  motion  pictures  have  been  riding  for  a  fall.  It's  all 
due  to  a  sudden  rush  of  money  to  the  head.  Cowboys  were 
yanked  off  the  ranch  and  sent  loco  with  the  effort  to  spend 
a  thousand  dollars  a  week.  Brainless  village  girls  and  artists' 
models  were  plunged  into  enormous  publicity  and  dazzled 
with  fortunes  for  making  a  few  faces  every  day  at  a  camera. 

"They  acted  like  drunken  Grand  Dukes  before  every 

17 


250  SOULS   FOR   SALE 

jeweler's  window.  They  gave  parties  that  were  nothing  but 
riots.  The  vampire  was  developed  as  a  special  attraction. 
The  press  agents  magnified  the  wickedness  of  their  clients. 
Divorces  were  considered  good  advertising. 

"There  are  sots  and  dope  fiends  among  us,  and  immorality 
enough  to  sink  a  ship." 

Tom  Holby  was  of  another  character.  What  he  loved  he 
adored,  fought  for,  would  not  criticize  or  permit  to  be 
criticized. 

"Hold  on  a  minute,  Claymore,"  he  broke  in.  "Is  there 
any  part  of  the  country  where  booze  parties  are  unknown? 
The  dope  fiends  aren't  all  in  Hollywood.  Every  other  town 
has  about  the  same  quota.  East  and  West  and  North  and 
South,  in  Europe,  Asia,  Africa — it's  the  same. 

"I  tell  you  the  average  morality  is  just  as  high  in  Holly 
wood  or  Culver  City  as  anywhere  else  in  the  world.  We're 
a  bunch  of  hard  workers  and  the  women  work  as  hard  as 
the  men.  They're  respected  and  given  every  opportunity 
for  wealth  and  fame  and  freedom.  The  public  has  been  fed  on 
a  lot  of  crazy  stories.  A  few  producers  have  kept  up  the  idea. 

"A  lot  of  bad  women  are  at  large  in  the  movies,  but  most 
of  'em  were  bad  before  they  came  in  and  they'd  have  been 
a  lot  worse  if  they  had  stayed  at  home.  The  moving  picture 
did  more  to  keep  girls  and  boys  off  the  streets  than  all  the 
prayer  meetings  ever  held.  They  drove  the  saloon  out  of 
business  more  than  any  other  power.  The  screen  is  the 
biggest  educational  and  moral  force  ever  discovered  and  it 
hasn't  got  a  fault  that  is  all  its  own.  I  tell  you  it's  a  cowardly 
shame  to  throw  dirt  on  it.  I  hold  my  head  just  a  little  higher 
than  ever,  and  I  am  shouting  just  a  little  louder  than  before, 
that  I'm  a  movie  man." 

Mem  looked  on  Tom  Holby  with  new  eyes.  She  had  never 
thought  of  him  as  a  fiery  patriot  in  his  art.  His  hot  zeal 
was  vastly  becoming  to  him  and  cast  into  the  shade  the 
revering  affection  she  had  gained  for  Claymore,  the  inspirer 
and  encourager  of  her  personal  skill.  Her  art  was  bigger 
than  herself  and  she  was  thrilled  with  almost  reverence  for 
Holby. 

To  the  surprise  of  everyone,  the  most  ardent  defender  of 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  251 

the  movies  was  the  least  expectable  of  all  in  such  a  gallery 
— Mrs.  Steddon,  the  minister's  wife. 

Her  demure,  shy  soul  kept  her  quiet  for  a  long  while,  but 
finally  she  struck  out  with  all  the  wrath  of  the  patient  and 
the  long-suffering.  She  was,  indeed,  now  a  Hollywood 
mother.  She  was  the  mother  of  all  the  movies  and  she 
lashed  forth  in  an  abrupt  frenzy  like  an  enraged  kitten. 

"Well,  I  think  it's  a  crying  shame  for  everybody  to  begin 
picking  on  such  lovely  people  who  work  so  hard  and  have 
such  good  hearts  and  do  so  much  to  make  the  world  brighter. 
And  if  you  make  it  brighter  you  make  it  better.  You  chil 
dren  mustn't  take  it  so  much  to  heart. 

"This  is  a  lynching  country  and  every  once  in  so  often 
they've  got  to  have  a  victim,  no  matter  where  they  find  him. 
When  I  was  a  girl  the  people  that  wanted  to  free  the  slaves 
were  treated  worse  than  what  movie  people  are,  and  when 
our  church  was  young  the  other  churches  used  to  treat  us 
terribly.  The  things  they  said  about  our  early  preachers — 
and  did  to  them — jail  and  whipping  posts  and  abuse — good 
gracious!  you'd  never  believe  it! 

"Look  what  they  did  to  Admiral  Dewey — one  day  the 
nation's  pet  hero,  and  the  next  a  yellow  dog.  They  gave 
him  a  house  for  a  gift,  and  w^hen  he  put  it  in  his  wife's  name, 
just  to  make  sure  of  it  for  her,  the  people  rose  and  treated 
him  worse  than  they  treated  Guiteau.  And  all  he  had  done 
was  to  be  nice  to  his  wife!" 

From  her,  of  all  people,  came  even  a  word  of  compassion 
for  the  object  of  the  nation's  wrath. 

* '  And  that  poor  young  man  who  got  into  all  the  trouble — 
he  couldn't  have  meant  to  do  any  harm.  He  was  just  a 
big,  overgrown  boy,  and  he  made  too  much  money  too 
soon,  and  he  drank  too  much.  Oh,  the  terrible  sufferings 
people  go  through  who  can't  help  drinking  too  much  when 
they  find  what  they've  done. 

"There  was  a  deacon  in  our  church,  a  good  man  as  ever 
was,  but  now  and  then  he'd  go  mad  for  liquor,  and  he  never 
knew  what  he  might  do.  Once,  after  a  long  period  of  being 
perfectly  nice,  he  tasted  the  communion  wine  and  left  the 
church  and  went  mad  crazy  with  whisky  and — oh  dear, 


252  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

how  he  wept  and  prayed!  Even  my  husband  was  sorry  for 
him.  Christ  was  sorry  for  everybody — even  for  the  people 
that  crucified  him. 

"And  that  young  man,  so  big  and  fat  and  funny — all  the 
world  laughed  at  him  and  paid  fortunes  to  see  him  act.  And 
now  people  are  after  him  like  wolves,  and  nobody  says  a 
good  word  for  him. 

"Even  if  he  had  done  what  they  said  he  did,  how  broken 
hearted  he  would  be  now!  It  seems  to  me  that  most  of 
the  people  who  howl  for  his  life  are  making  themselves 
crueler  than  what  they  say  he  was. 

"Nobody  seems  to  know  just  how  that  poor  girl  came  to 
her  death.  But  suppose  the  worst  that's  said  was  true. 
It's  not  half  as  bad  as  thousands  of  cases  that  have  gone  on 
in  this  country. 

"Why,  in  our  peaceful  little  town  there  was  a  terrible 
thing  happened.  I  hardly  dast  speak  of  it,  but  there  was 
a  pretty  young  girl,  a  wild  thing,  but  awful  pretty,  and 
some  young  fellows  got  a  lot  of  liquor,  and  she  was  alone 
with  them,  and  after  terrible  goings-on — why,  she  died  the 
next  day. 

"And  that  happened  right  in  our  home  town  of  Calverly 
long  before  moving  pictures  were  even  thought  of.  And 
not  a  line  was  published  in  a  single  newspaper,  not  a  sermon 
was  preached  against  it,  and  nobody  ever  dreamed  of  prose 
cuting  one  of  the  five  young  men  who  really  killed  that  poor, 
foolish  young  girl.  Two  of  the  men  were  members  of  my 
husband's  church.  They  were  terribly  sorry  and  repentant 
and  it  seemed  the  right  thing  to  hush  it  up  and  not  talk 
about  it. 

"I  guess  there  isn't  a  town  in  the  world  that  hasn't  had 
things  like  that  happen.  A  preacher's  wife  gets  to  know  the 
most  pitiful  things.  If  all  the  preachers  and  doctors  and 
mothers  and  fathers  would  tell  all  they  knew — oh  dear, 
what  revelations! 

"And  so  I  say,  why  should  everybody  act  like  this  young 
man  was  the  first  one  that  ever  did  anything  terrible  ?  Why 
should  they  say  it  had  anything  to  do  with  the  business  he 
was  in?  Why  should  they  persecute  the  dear,  good,  nice 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  253 

people  in  the  moving  pictures?  I  think  it's  just  frightiul 
and  if  I  was  in  the  movies  I  just  wouldn't  stand  it." 

Mem  throbbed  with  love  of  her  mother  for  her 
ardor,  but  she  bent  her  head,  realizing  her  own  secret. 
Claymore  stared  at  the  flaming  little  matron  with  gleaming 
eyes  of  approval.  Leva  Lemaire  squirmed,  ashamed  of  her 
own  acquiescence  in  the  storm  of  abuse. 

But  Tom  Holby  rose  from  his  chair  and,  going  to  Mrs. 
Steddon,  bent  down  and  kissed  her  on  the  hair  and  wrung 
her  little  hand  and  kissed  it. 

And  in  that  tribute  he  wooed  Mem  more  compellingly 
than  in  any  other  possible  wise. 

Mrs.  Steddon  clung  to  Tom  Holby 's  big  hand  and  patted 
it,  then  rose  and  left  the  room.  When  Mem  would  have 
followed,  she  was  sent  back.  Then  Mrs.  Steddon,  in  a  fine 
frenzy,  went  to  her  table  and  wrote  her  husband  an  answer 
to  his  letter. 

DEAR  HUSBAND, — I  am  ashamed  of  you  for  writing  such  a  mean 
little  note.  Yes,  I  am  proud  to  say  that  my  daughter  is  an  actress 
and  is  doing  fine  work.  If  you  are  not  proud  of  her  it  is  because 
you  don't  know  enough  to  be.  You  will  some  day,  you'll  see. 

She  is  working  hard  and  earning  lots  of  money,  and  I'm  going 
to  stay  with  her  as  long  as  she  needs  me.  I  guess  you  can  get  along 
without  me  awhile.  If  you  can't,  come  on  out  and  see  for  yourself 
how  wrong  you  are.  I  hope  your  next  letter  will  be  an  apology. 
Mem  would  send  her  love  if  she  knew  I  was  writing. 

Your  loving      WIFE. 

When  this  tiny  bomb  exploded  in  Doctor  Steddon 's  par 
sonage  it  produced  an  astounding  effect.  The  old  devil 
fighter  was  not  afraid  of  all  the  legions  of  hell.  He  could 
even  face  his  richest  pewholder  without  flinching;  he  could 
oppose  his  bishop  or  a  whole  assembly  of  fellow  ministers. 

But  he  was  afraid  of  that  little  wife  of  his.  She  alone 
could  scold  him  with  impunity  and  by  the  mere  withdrawal 
of  her  approval  cast  a  cloud  across  his  heaven.  He  was  in 
an  abject  perplexity  now. 

Mrs.  Steddon  was  as  much  afraid  of  Mem  as  her  husband 
was  of  her.  She  dared  not  tell  Mem  that  she  had  written  the 
letter  until  after  it  was  mailed  beyond  retrieving. 


254  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

Then  she  confessed,  and  Mem  startled  her  by  a  sudden 
collapse  into  bitter  grief. 

"I  have  come  between  you  and  papa.  I  have  disgraced 
the  family  and  lied  to  him  and  dragged  you  away  from  him 
and  set  you  against  him.  I  have  taken  you  away  from  the 
other  children,  and  broken  up  our  beautiful  home,  and  I 
wish  I  were  dead." 

Mrs.  Steddon  poured  out  lies  with  spendthrift  zeal  in  the 
effort  to  comfort  her  and  restore  her  pride.  "  Your  father 
needs  a  vacation,  and  your  sister  Gladys  Is  taking  better 
care  of  the  house  than  I  did." 

But  Mem's  grief  was  irredeemable. 

Yet  there  was  a  benefit  even  in  this.  Her  heart  was  so 
abrim  with  tears  that,  in  a  scene  next  day  when  Claymore 
wanted  her  to  weep,  he  had  only  to  call  for  tears  and  they 
gushed  in  torrents. 

And  from  this  enhanced  responsiveness  and  the  aggra 
vated  sympathy  it  aroused  in  his  heart  came  the  great  peril 
that  Tirrey  had  warned  the  girl  against — the  peril  not  of 
having  to  sell  herself,  but  of  giving  herself  away  just  for  the 
graciousness  of  the  deed. 


CHAPTER  XXXVII 

ALL  this  while  the  boy,  Terry  Dack,  had  been  troubling 
Mem's  conscience.  She  had  induced  the  mother  to 
give  up  her  safe  and  sane  career  as  a  washerwoman  and 
undertake  the  peculiar  offices  of  mother  to  a  prodigy.  But 
the  prodigy  had  not  yet  found  his  chance  to  prove  himself. 
The  producers  did  not  seem  to  be  so  eager  to  engage  the  boy 
as  Mem  had  expected. 

As  soon  as  she  was  installed  as  an  actress  she  ventured 
one  day  to  ask  Mr.  Tirrey  to  see  the  child;  he  consented  to 
make  an  appointment.  Mrs.  Dack  laundered  her  son  as 
carefully  as  if  he  were  a  week's  wash.  She  starched  and 
ironed  him  and  rendered  him  generally  unnatural.  She  was 
in  a  panic  of  anxiety,  but  the  boy's  reaction  to  this  was  one 
of  stodgy  reserve. 

Tirrey  kept  a  number  of  famous  candidates  waiting  while 
he  bent  to  receive  the  tiny  petitioner.  The  child  must  have 
found  something  lacking  in  this  effusive  courtesy  or  some 
offense  in  its  manifest  condescension,  for  he  refused  even  to 
shake  hands  and  retreated  into  his  mother's  bosom  like  a 
frightened  rabbit. 

The  more  the  mother  scolded  the  more  the  boy  froze.  The 
casting  director  was  patient,  but  plainly  not  encouraged. 
He  gave  up  at  length,  and  asked  his  assistant,  Mr.  Dobbs, 
to  place  in  the  files  a  picture  of  the  boy,  with  a  record  of  his 
age,  size,  color,  and  the  ominous  words,  "No  experience." 

Mem  and  Mrs.  Dack  left  the  office  disheartened.  Mrs. 
Dack  was  too  downcast  to  scold  or  punish.  She  could  only 
ask  the  boy  why  he  had  misbehaved.  She  might  as  well 
have  asked  why  his  hair  was  the  tint  it  was  or  his  features 
so  shaped. 

He  had  simply  not  been  in  the  humor,  and  he  had  not  yet 
been  trained  to  coerce  his  moods  to  respond  to  the  call. 


256  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

That  night  Mrs.  Back  came  to  see  Mem  to  say  that  she 
would  have  to  go  back  to  Palm  Springs  and  her  drudgery. 
She  was  afraid  to  attempt  a  washerwoman's  metier  in  Los 
Angeles,  though  there  was  need  enough  for  artists  in  her 
line.  She  suffered  tub  fright  in  a  strange  land. 

The  boy  felt  guilty.  He  had  suffered  keenly  when  his 
mother  broke  down  at  home  and  wept.  He  suffered  now 
when  his  beloved  Mem  appealed  to  him  frantically: 

"Oh,  honey,  why  were  you  so  mean  to  the  gentleman  who 
wanted  to  be  nice  to  you?" 

"I  don't  know,"  said  the  artist  in  embryo.  "Some 
thing  inside  of  me  just  wouldn't  behave.  I  wanted  it  to, 
but  I  couldn't  make  it." 

Mem  understood  this  language.  She  had  once  tried  to 
smile  and  wink  and  laugh  before  a  director,  and  had  found 
her  muscles  lead.  Terry's  failure  had  not  been  an  intentional 
insolence,  but  a  kind  of  mental  lockjaw. 

Even  the  salesman  cannot  be  at  his  cunningest  with  every 
customer;  and  shoes,  jewels,  lands,  and  creeds  are  as  hard 
to  sell  as  souls  when  the  ecstasy  is  wanting. 

While  Mrs.  Dack  was  trying  to  persuade  Mem  not  to 
blame  herself  for  the  fiasco,  urging  that  Palm  Springs  was  a 
nice  place  and  washing  a  good-enough  trade,  Claymore 
dropped  in  to  call. 

Mem  and  her  mother  and  Mrs.  Dack  were  in  Mem's 
bedroom  when  Leva  brought  word  that  Mem  had  a  caller. 

Mrs.  Dack  said  that  she  would  be  saying  good-by.  When 
she  put  out  her  hand,  like  a  hook,  for  the  child,  who  was 
usually  within  reach,  he  did  not  affix  himself  to  it.  When 
she  and  Mem  looked  about  for  him  they  found  him  in  the 
front  room,  perched  on  Claymore's  lap  and  making  violent 
love,  child  love,  to  the  captivated  tyrant.  The  boy's  big  fawn 
eyes  were  lustrous  with  affection,  the  little  fingers  were  wrap 
ping  and  unwrapping  their  tendrils  about  Claymore's  hand. 

The  women  stood  back  and  watched  the  two,  unnoticed. 
Terry  startled  Claymore  by  saying: 

"Why  do  you  scrooge  up  your  eyebrows  thataway?" 

"Do  I?"  gasped  Claymore. 

"Yep,  you  do.    Looky;  this  is  how  you  go." 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  257 

As  Claymore  flung  back  his  head  and  laughed  at  the 
revelation  of  an  unsuspected  habit  of  mien,  he  caught  sight 
of  Mem  in  the  embrasure  of  the  door  and  demanded: 

' '  Do  I  scrooge  up  my  eyebrows  ?    The  little  rat  says  I  do. ' ' 

"I  hadn't  noticed  it,  but  you  do,"  said  Mem.  Terry  was 
hilarious  with  pride,  and  Claymore,  who  distrusted  every 
thing  he  loved,  was  a  glutton  for  humiliation.  He  had  chosen 
a  profession  in  which  it  is  frequent,  public,  and  expensive. 

"I  wish  I  had  this  child  on  the  lot,"  he  said.  "We're 
getting  close  to  a  big  scene  in  this  next  picture  where  a  child 
is  ill  and  delirious.  The  boy  we  had  in  mind  has  just  had 
two  front  teeth  knocked  out  in  a  fight  at  school.  That 
won't  look  pretty  in  the  picture." 

Claymore,  directorlike,  loved  to  discover  new  talent,  dig 
up  gold  quartz  in  chunks  and  refine  them.  He  looked  down 
at  the  up-looking  boy. 

"Would  you  like  to  act  for  me?" 

"Yep;   you  bet." 

"Would  you  do  what  I  asked  you  to?" 

"You  bet." 

His  mother  said,  "He's  an  awful  good  little  tike — never 
cries  or — " 

"Never  cries?"  Claymore  gasped. 

"Except  when  he's  mad." 

"Oh!  Well,  he'll  cry  for  me,  I  guess,  if  I  ask  him  to. 
Won't  you,  old  man?" 

"You  bet." 

"You  come  over  to-morrow  and  see  the  casting  director. 
I'll  tell  him  to  bring  the  boy  to  me,  for  a  test.  Does  he  know 
anything  about  make-up?" 

Mem  shook  her  head  and  answered,  with  professional 
calm,  "I'll  make  him  up,  myself,  to-morrow  morning  early." 

And  now  there  was  rapture  in  the  household  of  Dack. 
The  widow  was  retrieved  from  the  wash  tub  at  the  desert's 
edge.  The  son  was  rescued  from  the  dull  lethargy  of  a  sage 
brush  future.  A  scepter  was  put  in  his  hand  and  he  would 
be  raised  aloft  to  such  glory  and  such  empire  as  no  infant 
monarch  had  ever  known.  If  he  succeeded,  millions  of 
men  and  women  in  every  land  would  gaze  up  at  his  living 


258  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

moving   portrait,    and   pay   him   the   homage   that   greets 
childhood  when  it  is  beautiful  in  the  sunlight. 

Terry  Dack  was  about  to  be  struck  off  in  innumerable 
portraits  and  showered  upon  a  grateful  world. 

At  the  age  of  five  he  would  commence  his  business  career 
with  a  salary  of  two  or  three  thousand  dollars  a  year. 

It  was  dazzling,  yet  some  people  called  it  a  dull  age  in  a 
dull  world,  and  looked  back  to  medieval  France  for  roman 
tic  happenings. 

And  many  exceedingly  good  people  would  hold  up  their 
hands  in  horror  at  such  cruel  treatment  of  a  child.  Turning 
from  the  hideous  revelations  of  immemorial  precocious 
depravity,  from  the  ghastly  records  of  the  children's  courts 
founded  by  Saint  Ben  Lindsey,  from  the  loathsome  spec 
tacles  of  the  streets  and  alleys  of  ancient  and  modern  times 
where  children  were  flung  like  garbage,  good  people  would 
revile  the  movies  as  a  degradation  of  children. 

The  police  and  the  lawmakers  would  regard  the  studios 
with  a  jealous  eye.  If  young  Mr.  Dack  failed  to  receive  at 
least  four  hours  of  schooling  on  any  day;  if  he  were  per 
mitted  to  work  more  than  four  hours  on  any  day,  the  guilty 
director  and  everybody  concerned  would  be  liable  to  heavy 
fines  and  imprisonment. 

But  the  Dacks  did  not  realize  into  what  odium  they  were 
descending.  They  felt  that  they  were  being  lifted  up  out  of 
despair  into  a  cloud  realm  of  bliss. 

Mrs.  Dack's  gratitude  was  so  dire  that  it  put  Claymore 
to  flight.  He  went  away  raging.  He  had  called  to  pay 
court  to  the  fascinating  Miss  Steddon,  and  he  had  adopted 
a  child  and  a  mother  whose  silly  enthusiasm  drenched  him 
like  a  capsized  tub  of  warm  suds. 

Mrs.  Dack  scurried  away  to  her  bleak  lodgings  to  unpack 
her  bundles.  Palm  Springs  might  pine  for  its  lost  laundress, 
but  the  world  would  be  the  happier  for  its  new-found  lamb. 

Terry  was  forever  getting  to  sleep  that  night.  He  was 
telling  his  mother  what  palaces  he  would  buy  her,  what  silks 
he  would  dress  her  in;  she  should  ride  in  two  solid-gold 
Fords  at  once,  with  a  policeman  for  driver. 

The  next  morning  the  Dacks  were  at  Mem's  door  before 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  259 

she  was  up.  They  sat  on  the  steps,  watching  the  red-faced 
sun  rise  yawning  from  his  bed  on  the  mountains.  They  saw 
the  newsboy  on  his  bicycle  fling  the  morning  paper  on  the 
dewy  grass,  and  Terry  decided  to  buy  himself  a  gold  bicycle. 

His  mother  tried  in  vain  to  hush  his  prattle.  Finally  the 
rattlesnake  whirr  of  an  alarm  clock  within  shook  the  bunga 
low  from  its  repose  and  they  made  their  presence  known. 

After  breakfast,  Mem  made  up  her  own  face  first  in  order 
to  get  it  out  of  the  way,  and  also  as  a  model  for  Mrs.  Dack 
to  copy.  Terry's  hands  clutched  at  the  various  pigments 
with  all  the  primeval  instinct  of  a  savage  desire  for  paint. 
He  repeated  the  names  of  the  various  layers  of  grease  and 
color  as  a  most  delightful  lesson. 

When  Mem  was  ready  to  begin  on  his  face  he  held  it  up 
like  a  little  balloon  for  adornment. 

Leva  had  taken  over  the  automobile  of  the  housemate 
who  had  gone  back  East  to  the  Middle  West.  She  drove  the 
Dacks  and  Mem  to  the  studio.  The  streets  were  full  of 
actors  and  actresses  in  automobiles  of  every  sort.  Most  of 
them  made  up  their  faces  at  home  and  some  of  them  put  on 
their  costumes  there. 

The  town  had  the  appearance  of  a  carnival's  morning 
after,  and  strangers  found  the  sight  astonishing.  But  to 
the  established  populace  it  was  nothing  but  the  daily  exodus 
to  the  factories  of  the  working  classes  in  their  overalls  and 
caps.  The  make-up  boxes  the  toilers  carried  were  merely 
their  tool  kits. 

The  iron  grills  at  the  studio  entrance  were  wide  open  and 
a  throng  poured  in.  Automobiles  were  parked  along  the 
curbs,  and  famous  artists,  extra  folk,  camera  men,  execu 
tives,  cabinetmakers,  electricians,  chemists,  scene  painters, 
decorators,  cowboys,  Chinese,  Arabians,  cooks,  waitresses 
— a  small  cityful — flocked  to  the  numberless  tasks  that  com 
bined  to  build  a  snow  of  pictures. 

Claymore  was  waiting  for  his  protege  and  carried  him 
off  to  his  set,  where  he  put  him  through  an  ordeal  he  was 
too  young  and  too  eager  to  regard  as  anything  but  the 
pastime  Claymore  pretended  it  was. 

The  boy's  magnetism  was  instant  with  everyone.    Every- 


260  SOUL'S    FOR    SALE 

one  smiled  at  the  sight  of  him.  He  put  a  live  coal  in  every 
heart  to  warm  its  cockles.  The  camera  man  smiled  and 
joked  as  he  turned  the  crank. 

Terry  Dack  had  that  which  gives  certain  poems,  dramas, 
paintings,  statues,  orations,  an  irresistible  fascination.  His 
wheedling  pout  might  be  known  for  a  mere  trick;  cynics 
might  resent  his  big  eyes,  his  babyish  prettiness,  and  rebel 
against  his  tears,  but  they  would  find  their  eyes  moist,  their 
lips  quivering,  their  hands  aching  to  caress  him  or  spank 
him.  He  could  not  be  ignored. 

Mr.  Bermond,  on  an  early  round  of  inspection,  stopped 
to  watch  the  test  being  made,  to  ask  who  the  child  was, 
and  to  mumble  to  Claymore,  "Sign  him  up!"  He  paused 
also  to  shake  hands  with  the  young  tyrant,  to  toss  him  in  the 
air  and  hug  him  tight  with  a  heartache  he  dared  not  confess. 

And  so  Terry's  fortune  was  made.  Or,  at  least,  it  was 
assigned  to  him  to  get.  It  would  not  be  so  easy  to  earn  as 
it  seemed.  He  would  not  realize,  himself,  what  intellect 
he  was  developing,  what  intuitional  processes  he  was  per 
fecting  in  the  laboratory  of  his  soul, 

He  was  sent  home  that  day  with  a  promise  of  a  verdict 
on  the  morrow.  He  left  the  studio  with  bitter  regret  and 
a  gnawing  terror.  His  fierce  imagination  dramatized  the 
deferment  as  exile. 

His  mother  took  the  contagion  of  fear  from  him,  and  they 
were  in  an  anguish  until  Mem  returned  that  evening  with 
the  glad  news  that  the  test  film  had  been  rushed  through 
the  laboratory  and  had  evoked  vast  enthusiasm  in  the  pro 
jection  room. 

It  was  always  a  problem  whether  the  charm  would  photo 
graph.  In  Terry's  case  the  picture  was  beyond  the  reality. 
His  skin  had  an  incandescence.  His  emotions  were  graphic 
upon  his  features. 

The  next  day  was  Terry's  first  birthday  as  an  artist. 
Mem  announced  herself  as  his  true  mother,  and  Claymore 
said,  "Then  I  am  his  father!" 

They  looked  at  each  other  with  a  kind  of  fright.  They  were 
already  linked  in  a  wedlock  of  art,  and  a  child  was  born  of  the 
union  of  their  souls.  And  this  had  terrifying  implications. 


CHAPTER  XXXVIII 

IT  helped  Terry's  art  somewhat  to  be  told  that  he  must 
play  a  little  girl.  That  angered  him  and  anger  gave  him 
pathos.  His  humiliation  was  only  a  child's  humiliation, 
but  the  pint  cup  brimming  with  bitterness  is  as  overcharged 
as  a  tun  of  malmsey. 

His  mimetic  genius,  after  the  first  shame  of  being  clad  in 
a  girl's  bonnet,  slip,  and  short  socks,  found  delight  in  a  satire 
on  the  poses  and  carriage  of  little  womankind. 

The  stage  was  a  magic  playground  to  him.  He  had  to 
have  his  schooling — they  gave  him  a  private  teacher  who 
put  him  through  his  spelling  and  sums  in  the  environs  of 
the  scene  where  he  was  called  now  and  then  to  enact  his 
role.  Work  was  recess  to  him,  and  he  scampered  from  his 
textbooks  to  the  set  as  to  a  wholesale  toy  shop. 

The  electricians  told  him  all  about  the  big  light  machines. 
The  property  men  let  him  help  them  with  their  labors.  The 
assistant  director  lent  him  the  megaphone  for  a  toy  and  he 
bellowed  through  it  like  an  infant  Stentor.  The  lady  who 
had  to  make  herself  look  very  old  with  all  manner  of  paint 
was  as  gentle  an  ogress  as  ever  ate  a  child.  The  beautiful 
star  held  him  in  her  lap,  and  he  learned  to  keep  his  hands 
off  her  make-up  and  kiss  her  behind  the  ear.  He  was  as 
close  to  heaven  as  a  child  may  climb  on  this  doleful  footstool. 
He  had  even  the  supreme  pride  of  condescension ;  for  an  even 
younger  actor  than  he  was  in  the  cast. 

He  felt  the  dignity  of  a  veteran  as  he  watched  the  scenes 
in  which  his  little  baby  "brother"  was  engaged.  This  child 
was  too  young  to  be  asked  to  act.  The  scenes  he  played  in 
had  to  be  played  as  games  and  they  were  costly  games,  for 
every  minute  spent  could  be  charged  off  as  five  dollars  gone. 

Even  if  Claymore  had  been  a  brute  he  would  have  found 
it  necessary  to  dissemble,  because  little  children  cannot  be 


262  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

coerced  to  drama,  though  they  may  be  whipped,  starved, 
scolded,  or  frightened  with  hell  fire  and  bogies  to  be  "good." 

Claymore  had  the  patience  of  a  born  mother.  The  baby's 
own  mother  was  vexed  and  easily  moved  to  anger.  She 
scolded,  yanked,  and  threatened,  and  Claymore  had  to 
protect  the  child  from  her  and  keep  her  out  of  sight  while 
he  conducted  the  strenuous  pretense. 

He  lay  on  his  stomach  on  the  floor  and  devised  seductive 
wiles  while  the  camera  men  and  the  light  crew  watched  for 
his  signal  to  begin  their  record. 

Part  of  this  picture  was  a  domestic  comedy,  and  this  baby 
was  supposed  to  escape  from  its  nurse  and  its  anxious  mother ; 
to  find  a  loaded  pistol,  play  with  it,  look  down  the  barrel, 
and  bite  the  fatal  muzzle.  Of  course  the  pistol  was  not 
really  loaded,  but  it  was  hoped  that  the  effect  would  give  the 
audience  that  bit  of  blood  curdle  for  which  it  loves  to  pay 
its  best  money. 

Claymore  would  hand  the  baby  a  morsel  of  candy,  drop 
another  down  the  barrel  for  the  child  to  peer  after  and  try 
to  extract.  Then  Claymore  would  scuttle  backward  out  of 
the  range  of  the  cameras,  motion  the  electricians  to  hit  the 
lights  and  the  camera  men  to  crank. 

He  cooed  to  the  baby  in  prattling  terms,  struggling  to  keep 
it  so  absorbed  in  its  task  that  it  would  not  look  out  toward 
the  camera  and  betray  to  future  audiences  the  presence  of  a 
coach. 

Time  after  time  something  diverted  the  baby's  mind. 
Just  as  the  scene  was  rolling  perfectly  the  child  would  look 
away  and  fling  the  pistol  down,  or  wave  its  hand  and  grin 
at  some  one  in  front.  Then  the  task  had  to  be  begun  again. 
The  child  had  an  impish  gift  for  giving  the  camera  men  false 
starts  and  then  ruining  the  most  promising  take-offs. 

The  director,  groveling  about  the  floor,  would  not  despair, 
but  returned  to  the  toil  with  a  persistence  much  praised  in 
spiders  and  ants  and  other  stubborn  industrials. 

The  author  of  the  continuity  had  to  leave  the  set  and 
tear  his  hair  and  curse  to  get  rid  of  his  nerves.  The  pro 
duction  manager,  whose  business  it  was  to  keep  the  picture 
going  at  high  speed  and  low  cost,  fumed  and  figured  the 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  263 

expense.  He  said  to  the  director,  "That  damned  brat  has 
cost  the  picture  three  thousand  dollars  so  far  without  a  foot 
of  film  to  show  for  it." 

Claymore,  whose  sympathy  was  inexhaustible  as  long  as 
there  was  an  honest  effort,  resented  the  insult  to  one  of  his 
cast.  And  eventually  he  won  his  point,  decoyed  the  baby 
through  the  scene,  and  caught  it  with  two  cameras.  The 
audience  would  never  dream  of  the  toil  or  the  cost  as  it 
smiled  at  the  brief  frivolity.  But  then  it  is  the  pride  of  the 
true  artist  to  conceal  his  toil  as  something  obscene,  a  disgrace 
if  discovered. 

Terry  Dack  had  no  such  patience  for  his  bungling  junior 
as  the  director  showed.  He  was  impatient  to  get  to  his  own 
scenes,  and  when  at  last  they  were  reached  he  began  life  anew. 

He  romped  and  whooped  with  laughter  during  the  long 
waits  between  the  brief  takes  while  the  lights  were  being 
brought  up,  the  camera  angles  discussed,  the  properties 
arranged. 

The  moment  the  word  ' '  Action ! ' '  rang  out  he  became  the 
earnest  artist.  Already  he  knew  that,  while  tragic  scenes 
may  be  played  in  a  cheerful  atmosphere,  comedy  must  be 
approached  solemnly.  He  agonized  over  his  humor,  but 
he  did  not  lose  self-control  in  pathos. 

Once,  between  the  first  take  and  the  second  of  a  pathetic 
scene,  he  began  to  tell  a  funny  story  to  the  camera  man. 

Claymore  said:  "Don't  laugh  in  this  scene,  now.  It's 
very  serious." 

If  a  super  had  told  Edwin  Booth  not  to  giggle  when  he 
went  on  in  The  Soliloquy,  he  might  have  received  a  glance 
of  similar  barb.  Claymore  apologized  hastily. 

But  Terry's  pride  in  his  superiority  to  the  bungling  baby 
was  doomed  to  fall.  There  was  a  scene  where  he  and  his 
brother  painted  each  other's  lips  with  their  stage  mother's 
rouge  stick.  There  was  a  scene  where  they  said  their  prayers 
at  the  actress's  knee.  In  these  he  shone  and  in  moments  of 
childish  pathos.  But  by  and  by  the  crisis  arrived  when 
Terry  must  play  a  lost  and  abandoned  waif  freezing  in  a 
dark  doorway,  and  sobbing  in  lonely  dismay  as  he  groped 
blindly  for  his  mother  and  called  her  name. 


264  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

He  had  responded  to  all  the  demands  upon  his  armory  of 
smiles  and  glooms,  but  when  Claymore  appealed  for  tears 
they  would  not  flow. 

Terry  tried  and  tried.  He  squeezed  his  eyes.  He  stared 
at  the  lights.  He  tried  to  think  of  sad  things,  but  never  a 
bit  of  brine  responded. 

Even  the  groping  of  his  hands  was  awkward  and  unreal. 

Claymore  explained,  "I  want  you  to  do  just  what  you  do 
when  you  are  sick  or  afraid  at  night  and  you  reach  out  in 
the  dark  and  feel  for  your  mother." 

"Oh,  but  I  never  do!"  said  Terry,  with  a  certain  loftiness 
of  demurrer. 

This  ended  that.  Claymore  pondered.  "Did  you  ever 
play  blindman's  buff?" 

"You  bet!" 

"Do  you  remember  how  you  would  put  your  hands  out 
when  your  eyes  were  shut?" 

"Oh  yes!    I  see  what  you  mean  now.     Like  thisaway." 

And  he  clenched  his  eyes  and  put  his  plump  hands  forth, 
stroking  the  air  to  find  his  mother's  cheek. 

"Great!  We'll  take  it!"  said  Claymore.  The  camera 
man  called,  "Hit  'em!"  The  glare  poured  from  the  con 
centrated  arcs.  The  music  struck  up  a  sobbing  tune.  The 
director  called:  "Action!  Camera!"  And  Terry  groped 
pitifully. 

So  far  so  good.  But  next  was  the  crying  scene,  and  the 
weeping  must  be  real.  Glycerine  tears  would  be  an  insult 
to  both  audience  and  actor. 

Claymore  tried  to  tune  the  actor  up  to  the  climax  by 
explaining  the  situation.  Terry  nodded  like  an  old  scholar. 
But  no  tears  rose.  Claymore  appealed  to  the  boy's  sympa 
thies  for  the  character,  for  himself.  He  spoke  in  his  most 
tear-compelling  intonations.  But  not  a  tear  would  well 
from  the  desert  of  Terry's  dry  orbs. 

"Think  of  your  mother  being  awful  sick  and  dying,  far 
away  from  you!" 

But  Terry  was  too  much  of  an  actor  to  take  this  bait. 
"What's  my  mother  got  to  do  with  this  movin'  pitcher?" 
he  asked,  in  fine  sincerity. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  265 

Claymore  took  up  other  weapons.  He  hammered  that 
usually  malleable  little  soul  almost  raw.  Three  hundred 
dollars  had  gone  to  the  waste  basket  already  and  not  a  foot 
of  film  was  even  spoiled  yet. 

Claymore  did  not  lose  his  temper,  for  he  could  see  that 
the  child  was  wrestling  with  his  own  unresponsive  tear  ducts. 
But  he  grew  anxious  for  his  story.  It  was  essential  that  the 
child  should  weep  and  thousands  of  feet  had  already  been 
taken  with  this  scene  in  view. 

At  length  he  remembered  what  Terry's  mother  had  said, 
"He  only  cries  when  he  is  mad." 

And  now  he  shifted  his  approach.  He  made  all  ready  for 
the  shot.  He  pretended  a  deep  disgust  for  Terry,  put  him 
off  his  lap  with  a  curt:  "You  are  a  quitter.  The  trouble 
with  you  is  that  you're  not  trying." 

"I  am  so  trying!"  Terry  gasped,  astounded. 

Claymore  enacted  contempt.  "No,  you're  not!  You're 
just  in  an  ugly,  stubborn  mood.  You  can  see  that  we're 
all  waiting  here,  the  light  crew,  the  camera  men.  You  know 
the  picture  can't  go  on  till  we  get  this  easy  scene  finished. 
Mr.  Woburn  [the  author]  has  to  have  this  scene  in  his  story 
or  it's  spoiled.  But  what  do  you  care?  Mr.  Bermond  has 
paid  you  money  and  wants  to  pay  you  more,  but  just  to 
spite  him  and  all  of  us  you  hold  back  your  tears." 

The  injustice  of  this  outraged  the  child's  soul.  He  stamped 
his  foot  in  protest. 

"That  ain't  so!" 

"It  is  so,  so!"  Claymore  snapped  back,  and  again  he 
flaunted  the  red  rag.  "You  can  cry  as  well  as  anybody. 
You  know  that  I've  been  friends  with  you,  and  I  thought 
you  were  friends  with  me  and  with  the  star  and  Miss  Sted- 
don,  here.  But  you're  worse  than  the  little  baby  who 
wouldn't  play  with  the  pistol.  He  didn't  know  any  better. 
But  you — there's  only  one  thing  keeping  you  from  crying." 

"Wha-a-at?"  whimpered  Terry,  his  lips  shivering,  his 
chin  puckering  as  with  a  drawstring,  his  throat  gulping 
till  Mem  could  hardly  keep  from  dashing  to  his  rescue. 

Claymore  snarled:    "It's  your  meanness.    You're  a  dirty 

little  alley  cat,  a  spiteful  little  alley  cat." 
18 


266  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

"I  am  no-ot  a  nalley  ca-at!"  Terry  sobbed. 

"  Of  course  you  are.  You  don't  belong  on  the  screen.  Go 
on  back  to  your  alley,  you  cat.  Go  on  back  to  the  desert 
with  the  other  coyotes.  We  don't  want  you  here,  because 
you  won't  cry." 

' '  I  will  so  cry !    Boo-hoo — I — will  cry ! ' ' 

Claymore  tossed  his  voice  in  scorn. 

"Oh,  you  might  make  a  lot  of  sniffles,  but  you  wouldn't 
dream  of  crying  like  a  lost  child,  'I  want  my  mamma!' " 

"I  want  my  mamma!"  Terry  howled. 

The  flood  broke  from  a  suddenly  blackened  sky.  Sobs 
shook  his  frame.  Tears  spilled  and  darted  across  his  fat 
cheeks.  The  childish  treble  rang  wild. 

Carpenters  working  on  distant  sets  paused  with  the  heart 
stab  a  child's  cry  thrusts  into  the  breast. 

The  electricians,  the  property  men,  the  actors  and 
actresses,  gulped  and  clenched  their  hands. 

Terry  did  not  see  the  lights  come  on  at  Claymore's  signal. 
He  did  not  see  Claymore  tap  the  elbows  of  the  camera  men 
nor  hear  the  cranks  scuttering. 

He  sobbed  and  sobbed  while  Claymore  goaded  him  on, 
giving  him  his  cue  disguised  as  abuse,  "I  want  my  mamma! 
You  alley  cat ! "  in  antiphony  with  Terry's  increasing  anguish. 

1 '  I  want  my  mamma !  Shut  up !  /  want  my  mamma.  I 
WANT  MY  MAMMA!" 

There  was  something  uncanny  and  cruel  about  it  in  Mem's 
mind.  It  was  a  form  of  torture,  a  Spanish  Inquisition  not 
after  beliefs  or  confessions,  but  after  stored-up  emotions. 
Mem's  blood  ran  cold  at  the  shameful  business  of  flogging 
that  young  soul  to  such  old  woes. 

She  was  ready  to  rush  into  the  sacred  circle  of  the  set  and 
attack  Claymore  for  his  brutality.  She  would  lose  her  own 
career,  but  she  would  escape  complicity  in  such  a  low  trade. 

Just  before  she  sprang  to  the  attack  she  heard  Claymore 
stop  the  cameras  with  the  word,  "Cut!"  The  first  camera 
man  called  to  the  chief  electrician,  "Rest  'em!"  Then 
the  relentless  torturer,  Claymore,  ran  forward,  picked  Terry 
up  in  his  arms,  hugged  him  to  his  heart,  and  kissed  him, 
mumbling : 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  267 

4 'That's  my  boy!  That's  the  good,  brave  artist  I  thought 
he  was." 

The  briny  victim  peered  through  the  dripping  eaves  of 
his  drenched  eyelashes  and  said: 

"Was  'at  all  right?    Honest?    Did  I  cry  good?" 

And  when  Claymore  groaned,  "Great!"  Terry  laughed 
aloud  and  twisted  Claymore's  ear,  kissed  him,  and  throttled 
his  neck  with  his  short  arms  as  he  yelled: 

"Mamma!  Mamma!  Mister  Claymore  says  'at  was 
great!" 

Mrs.  Dack  ran  forward  to  embrace  him,  her  heartaches 
turned  to  aches  of  pride. 

In  the  good  old  days  children  had  been  beaten  incessantly ; 
stout  rods  were  spoiled  religiously  to  spare  the  children  from 
the  perils  of  hell.  Stories  of  goblins,  of  ogres,  of  child-eating 
witches  and  wolves,  had  filled  the  nursery  books  and  the 
nursery  talk.  Myriads  of  children  had  been  slain  to  anni 
hilate  their  races.  In  Russia  at  this  time  children  dead  of 
starvation  were  heaped  in  windrows  by  the  thousand.  End 
less  armies  had  been  sent  to  the  coal  mines,  the  factories, 
to  the  starvation  and  duress  of  foundling  asylums,  poor 
farms.  In  old  England  two  little  girls  of  eight  had  been 
kept  in  solitary  cells  for  over  a  year,  hundreds  of  children 
were  hanged  for  theft.  The  babies  of  devout  parents  had 
been  doomed  to  gloomy  homes  and  dour  repressions  for  their 
souls'  sakes.  Little  children  had  been  trained  to  sob  and 
weep  for  the  sins  they  inherited  from  Adam  and  for  the  fires 
of  hell  awaiting  their  least  misstep. 

This  child  had  been  constrained  to  weep  in  a  game  of 
pretense  and  perhaps  a  million  people  would  wreep  because 
he  wept,  a  million  people  would  feel  the  pity  of  childhood, 
and  thousands  of  children  would  be  better  cherished  for  the 
brief  martyrdom  of  Terry  Dack. 

"He  who  would  make  others  weep  must  first  have  wept 
himself."  And  Terry  had  learned  the  gentle  art  of  altruistic 
tears.  His  heart  had  enlarged  its  education.  To  his  techni 
cal  equipment  a  great  weapon  had  been  added. 

In  a  later  scene  he  had  to  cry  again,  and  now  it  was  he 
that  pleaded  with  Claymore  in  his  anxiety  for  perfection. 


268  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

"I'll  cry  all  you  want  if  you'll  on'y  make  me  mad  again. 
Call  me  a  nalley  cat.  That  makes  me  awful  mad." 

Obediently  Claymore  called  him  an  alley  cat  and  even  a 
gutter  snipe;  and  he  caterwauled  magnificently  with  neat 
ness  and  dispatch. 

And  so  in  many  layers  his  little  soul  worked,  striving  to 
present  a  faithful  transcript  of  child  life,  child  comedy, 
child  tragedy,  in  order  to  buy  his  mother  pretty  things  and 
to  save  her  back  from  the  torture  of  the  tub,  and  to  buy 
himself  learning,  power,  wealth,  fame,  and  a  future  of  bound 
less  scope. 

There  was  a  divinity  about  it. 

Terry  was  a  veteran  indeed  now.  He  had  been  under  fire. 
He  had  played  a  big  scene,  had  shed  and  inspired  salt  water, 
or,  as  the  technical  term  was,  he  had  "got  the  tear." 

Yet,  superior  as  he  felt  to  his  junior,  the  infant  that  had 
played  with  the  pistol,  he  was  himself  a  novice  to  a  veteran 
who  gave  him  much  useful  advice  and  comfort — a  girl  of 
twelve,  an  old  actress  in  a  young  art. 

Polly  Thorne  had  been  a  moving-picture  actress  since 
she  was  five.  She  belonged  to  a  stepladder  family  of  ten 
children,  all  of  them  on  the  screen,  all  of  them  wholesome, 
handsome,  happy  people  like  their  parents,  also  filmers. 

Polly  was  a  figure  of  national  importance.  She  had  created 
a  role  in  a  long  series  of  pictures  of  childhood. 

But  Polly,  alas!  had  been  doomed  to  play  the  little  minx 
and  tattletale  who  always  told  on  her  brother.  Famous 
little  Polly  and  her  mother  had  been  sent  on  a  long  cross- 
continental  tour  of  personal  appearances  at  moving-picture 
theaters.  She  had  returned  in  time  to  work  in  Claymore's 
cast. 

But  there  was  a  sorrow  in  her  heart.  She  had  found  that 
because  of  her  brilliant  impersonation  of  the  spiteful  little 
wretch,  the  stupid  public  confused  her  character  with  her 
characterization.  In  Minneapolis  she  had  overheard  a  press 
agent  say  that  he  would  not  even  escort  her  to  the  theater 
because  she  was  such  a  vixen !  She  loved  her  public,  and  it 
was  a  bitterness  to  have  it  persuaded  that  she  was  unlovable. 

Her  eternal  plea  was  now  for  some  scene  that  would 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  269 

redeem  her  reputation.  She  longed  to  show  before  the 
camera  the  kindly  spirit  she  revealed  away  from  it. 

But  most  of  all  she  longed  for  what  all  actresses  long  for 
— a  crying  scene.  Two  things  the  normal  actress  desires 
above  all  things:  to  weep  and  to  be  murdered  cor  am  populo 
— as  every  actor  wants  most  of  all  to  play  Hamlet,  debate 
suicide,  and  be  slain  with  a  poisoned  rapier. 

Polly  entreated  Claymore  incessantly: 

"Oh,  please,  dear  good  Mr.  Claymore,  won't  yon — 
wouldn't  you — couldn't  you  kindly  please  put  in  a  little 
scene  where  I  can  cry?" 

"I  don't  see  how  I  can  in  this  picture,  Polly  kins,"  Clay 
more  protested.  "I'll  have  the  next  picture  written  so  that 
you  can  drown  in  your  own  tears." 

"Oh,  but  the  next  one  may  never  come!"  Polly  urged. 
"I'm  getting  too  big  to  play  little  girls,  and  I  won't  be  big 
enough  to  play  onjanoos  for  two  or  three  years.  I  may  have 
to  leave  the  screen  for  a  while.  Couldn't  you  just  slip  in  a 
little  bit?  You  know,  when  Miss  Steddon  is  sick — why 
couldn't  I  go  to  her  and  pet  her  a  little  and  cry  over  her?" 

"I'll  see  the  author,"  said  Claymore,  "or  maybe  you'd 
better." 

Polly  turned  the  witchery  of  her  shining  eyes  on  the 
author,  wheedled  him,  flattered  him,  courted  him,  all  for  the 
boon  of  a  little  brine. 

And  finally  she  coaxed  a  promise  from  him  that  he  would 
interpolate  a  scene  with  Miss  Steddon  and  give  Polly  a  good 
cry. 

The  news  was  glorious.  She  darted  to  her  mother,  squeal 
ing  with  delight.  She  ran  back  and  kissed  the  confused 
scribe,  who  would  one  day  boast  that  the  great  Polly  Thorne 
had  honored  him  with  such  a  seal  of  approval. 

Polly  dashed  to  Mem  and  sat  upon  her  lap,  tremulous 
with  the  rapture  of  her  promotion  to  the  dignity  of  a  priestess 
of  grief.  Mem  understood  the  thrill.  She  was  looking  back 
already  from  an  increasing  remoteness  upon  the  excitement 
of  her  own  novitiate. 

Strange  people,  these  actors,  who  plead  for  suffering! 
Yet  what  else  do  the  rest  of  us  but  cultivate  misery,  hug  it 


27o  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

to  our  hearts,  run  to  embrace  assured  regret,  make  a  habit 
of  renewed  remorse,  resent  all  warnings  and  sign  posts,  and 
store  up  repentance  in  lavender,  in  old  attics,  in  revisited 
scenes  and  haunted  night  thoughts? 

Since  we  cannot  always  find  grief  enough  at  home  or  in 
the  misbehavior  of  our  neighbors,  we  have  a  gory  newspaper 
dropped  at  our  doors  every  morning.  We  snatch  at  extras, 
the  bloodier  the  better.  We  buy  magazines  and  books 
dripping  with  assorted  woes  for  every  taste;  we  have  story 
tellers,  songsters,  fiddlers,  poets,  painters,  playero  to  make 
us  writhe.  We  put  tragic  art  at  the  top  of  the  heap  and  pay 
him  or  her  the  most  homage,  and  usually  the  most  money, 
who  wrings  the  most  drops  out  of  our  twisted  hearts. 

The  moving  picture  made  its  instant  appeal  because  it 
brought  the  most  agony  within  the  reach  of  the  masses  at 
the  greatest  convenience  with  the  least  expense. 


CHAPTER  XXXIX 

HAVE  a  job  and  get  a  job.    To  him  that  hath — 
Remember  Steddon's  first  picture  was  approaching 
its  finish  by  a  zigzag  path,  the  scenes  being  shot  according 
to  their  geography  rather  than  chronology. 

In  one  episode  Mem  was  photographed  stealing  in  through 
a  front  door  and  crossing  a  hall  into  a  drawing-room.  When 
this  was  rehearsed  and  taken  several  times,  she  was  imme 
diately  required  to  return  across  the  hallway  from  the  draw 
ing-room  and  carry  with  her  the  memory  and  the  influence 
of  what  had  taken  place  in  the  drawing-room. 

But,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  the  art  director  and  his  crew  of 
carpenters  and  decorators  had  not  yet  constructed  the 
drawing-room.  It  was  still  building  on  another  stage,  two 
hundred  yards  away,  and  the  scene  could  not  be  taken  for 
a  week. 

Furthermore,  the  preceding  scene  in  the  street  had  not 
been  taken.  It  would  be  shot  on  location  in  a  street  several 
miles  away. 

The  actress  had,  therefore,  to  recall  what  she  had  done 
long  before  she  did  it. 

This  was  one  of  the  inescapable  difficulties  of  the  technic. 
Every -art  has  its  absurdities  and  contradictions,  and  the 
moving-picture  actor  must  perform  incessant  Irish  bulls  of 
sequence. 

But  all  of  Mem's  anxieties  concerning  make-up  and  cos 
tume  and  interpretation  were  overwhelmed  in  the  anxiety 
as  to  her  future.  She  dreaded  any  hiatus  in  her  career, 
another  fretful  hunting  for  more  work. 

She  had  been  already  acquiring  a  little  name.  Gossip  of 
every  sort  was  rife,  and  some  of  it  was  flattering.  The  word 
floated  about  that  "Steddon  was  making  good  at  Ber- 
mond's." 


272  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

Other  directors  began  to  speak  to  her  on  the  lot  and  at 
the  luncheon  table.  The  matron  in  charge  of  the  dressing 
rooms  told  her  that  she  had  heard  several  people  speak  of 
Miss  Steddon's  fine  work.  The  man  in  charge  of  a  projection 
machine  told  her  one  day,  "Very  nice,  Miss  Steddon!" 
That  was  praise  from  a  jaded  expert.  Some  of  the  other 
actresses  on  the  set  had  confessed  that  she  had  mads  them 
cry  and  choke  up.  She  had  "the  stuff."  She  was  deliver 
ing  the  goods.  Her  soul  was  getting  over. 

At  home  she  found  a  note  now  and  then  asking  her  to  call 
at  another  studio.  Agents  sent  her  proffers  of  their  good 
offices  and  promised  to  enhance  her  opportunities  and  her 
earnings. 

But  the  Bermond  Company  had  an  option  on  her  services. 
This  included  the  right  to  farm  her  out  for  single  pictures  to 
other  companies.  It  was  a  flattering  kind  of  slavery.  Still 
more  flattering  was  Bermond 's  reluctance  to  lend  her  to  a 
rival. 

Eventually,  Bermond  agreed  to  rent  Mem  to  a  new 
company  that  was  to  make  Tom  Holby  a  star.  He  had 
earned  the  elevation,  and  this  meant  that  he  and  Robina 
Teele  would  part  company — at  least  upon  the  screen. 

When  Mem  read  of  this  plan  on  the  motion-picture  page 
of  an  evening  paper  her  heart  gave  a  hop,  as  if  a  fat  frog 
had  leaped  in  her  bosom.  She  was  not  sure  just  what  the 
excitement  meant  within  her  there. 

She  did  not  want  Tom  Holby  for  herself,  yet  she  did  not 
want  to  see  any  other  woman  land  him. 

Claymore  obtruded  upon  her  meditations.  She  was  under 
the  obligation  imposed  by  his  devotion. 

It  was  certain  that  he  and  Mem  must  sever  the  relations 
they  had  established  as  director  and  directed,  but  a  deep 
friendship,  something  deeper  than  friendship,  had  developed 
during  their  communion. 

He  had  found  her  increasingly,  irresistibly  fascinating  as 
he  ransacked  odd  corners  of  her  heart  for  emotional  material ; 
as  he  studied  her  expressions  and  postures;  as  he  thought 
of  her  in  her  absence.  Before  him,  she  moved  about  to 
music,  and  that  lifted  them  to  another  planet  somehow. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  273 

He  tried  to  be  particularly  aloof,  professional,  and  direc 
torial  in  his  conduct  with  Mem,  lest  the  company  discover 
his  infatuation.  But  his  love  was  less  and  less  content 
with  courtesy  alone.  The  very  effort  emphasized  what  he 
sought  to  hide,  and  the  whisper  went  about  that  Claymore 
and  Steddon  were  thicker  than  thieves.  They  gave  the 
impression  of  a  bride  and  groom  pretending  to  be  old  married 
people  and  only  advertising  their  infatuation  by  their  aggra 
vated  indifference. 

Mem  was  not  blind  to  the  look  in  his  eyes,  nor  deaf  to  the 
overtones  in  his  voice.  She  wondered  for  a  while  that  so 
powerful  a  man  should  have  selected  so  humble  an  appren 
tice  and  let  the  star  glide  by  unworshiped. 

Her  heart  was  mellowed  with  a  kind  of  upward  pity  for 
the  great  man  that  she  was  dragging  down  to  her  own  meek 
level.  But  it  was  pleasant  to  be  adored. 

All  day  they  labored  over  the  mimicry  of  love  and  woe, 
and  yet  they  gained  no  private  immunity  from  its  fever. 

When  he  called  of  evenings,  Claymore  would  make  excuses 
to  step  out  into  the  patio  with  Mem  to  show  her  a  very 
remarkable  moon. 

He  persuaded  her  now  and  then  to  stroll — anything  to 
get  her  away  from  the  eyes  and  ears  of  her  mother  and  her 
housemates. 

He  never  said  anything,  however,  that  he  might  not  have 
said  before  a  crowd.  He  never  tried  to  hold  her  hand  or 
snatch  a  kiss  or  filch  an  embrace.  Mem  was  constantly 
set  quivering  with  expectancy  that  he  would  make  some 
advance,  some  gesture  of  endearment,  yet  always  unable 
to  decide  just  what  she  would  do  if  he  did.  But  he  didn't. 

She  wondered  at  his  curious  shyness.  For  a  man  of  such 
autocracy  and  such  a  habit  of  ordering  her  about  before 
people,  to  be  afraid  to  speak  to  her  in  solitude — it  was 
funny. 

She  did  not  realize  that  his  chief  battle  was  with,  himself. 
He  knew  the  perils  a  director  runs  who  lets  himself  flirt  with 
or  favor  one  of  his  company.  Even  to  deliver  himself  to 
bandied  jokes  was  unbearable.  He  fought  his  love  for  the 
sake  of  his  pride  of  office. 


274  SOULS    FOR   SALE 

So  he  did  not  speak,  but  he  ached,  and  he  communicated 
his  anguish  to  the  very  air. 

The  picture  and  its  final  retakes  were  finished  on  a  Satur 
day  afternoon.  There  was  an  evening's  idleness  ahead. 
Claymore  asked  Mem  to  take  a  drive  in  his  car,  a  long 
farewell  flight  about  the  familiar  and  the  un visited  roads. 
She  accepted  meekly.  Something  told  her  that  this  drive 
was  important  to  her  fate. 

Something  was  always  telling  her  something.  Nine  times 
out  of  ten  it  was  false,  but  she  forgot  the  failures  and  recalled 
the  coincidences. 


CHAPTER  XL 

NOBODY  had  yet  asked  Mem  for  her  self-respect  as  an 
initiation  fee  or  an  initiation  rite.  She  was  paid  a 
weekly  wage  based  upon  her  ability,  her  experience,  and 
her  usefulness.  She  was  paid  in  coin  of  the  realm. 

Her  price  would  rise  and  fall  according  to  the  general 
market  for  moving  pictures  and  her  specific  value.  Her 
emotion  and  her  beauty  were  commodities,  and  Steddon 
stock  would  be  quoted  on  the  Soul  Exchange  as  the  demand 
for  it  rose  and  fell,  as  the  bidders  for  it  increased  or 
diminished. 

She  could  not  add  to  her  artistic  assets  by  incurring  moral 
liabilities.  If  her  sins  were  discreet  or  picturesque  they 
would  not  affect  the  public  esteem.  If  they  were  unlucky- 
sins,  she  might  find  herself  suddenly  bankrupt,  closed  out, 
shut  down. 

Up  to  now  she  had  met  no  more  of  those  compliments 
which  are  called  "insults"  than  any  girl  is  likely  to  meet 
with  as  she  goes  her  way  through  any  community.  Her 
mother  had  been  with  her  almost  all  the  time  when  she  was 
not  on  the  lot,  and  the  lot  was  full  of  mothers  of  little  chil 
dren  and  young  stars. 

Claymore  had  been  chaperoned  by  the  company  and  his 
own  reverence  for  discipline.  But  now  she  was  outside  his 
authority.  Both  were  outside  the  Bermond  inclosure. 

The  picture  was  finished.  Claymore  could  offer  her  no 
more  scenes,  no  more  advantages,  no  more  roles,  not  even 
the  little  tributes  of  special  close-ups  or  flattering  lightings 
or  the  tender  privilege  of  being  "shot  through  gauze"  or 
out  of  focus. 

And  now  they  were  as  helpless  together  as  any  other  twain 
whom  nothing  restrains  or  separates  in  the  undertow  of  pas 
sion.  They  were  two  emotional  people  without  a  barrier. 


276  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

Among  the  countless  things  written  and  said  about  the 
hows  and  whys  of  women's  surrenders  one  motive  seems  to 
have  been  too  much  ignored,  though  it  must  have  exerted 
a  vast  influence  on  countless  women,  must  exert  an  increas 
ing  influence  as  women  go  more  and  more  into  the  worlds 
of  business,  of  art,  and  of  freedom  with  only  themselves  for 
their  guardians. 

Good  sportsmanship,  a  hatred  of  smuggery,  a  contempt 
for  too  careful  self -protection,  a  disgust  for  a  holier-than- 
thou  self-esteem — these  are  amiable  attitudes  of  mind  that 
make  for  popularity.  To  be  a  miser  of  one's  graces,  a  hypo- 
chondriacal  coddler  of  one's  virtues,  is  to  be  unloved  and 
unlovable. 

So  many  a  man  will  gamble,  break  a  law,  risk  his  career, 
his  health,  his  life,  get  drunk,  steal,  slay,  and  play  the  fool 
rather  than  face  the  reproach  that  he  is  a  mollycoddle,  a 
Puritan,  a  prig,  a  Miss  Nancy,  a  coward,  a  Pharisee. 

And  many  a  woman  who  would  not  yield  for  passion  or 
for  luxury  must  have  consented  for  fear  of  seeming  to  be 
overproud,  stingy,  cold,  prudish,  disobliging,  superhuman, 
subnormal,  unsportswomanly. 

Mem  had  been  swept  once  beyond  the  moorings  by  a 
summer  storm  of  devotion  to  young  Farnaby,  her  first  love. 
Now  she  was  to  feel  her  anchors  cut  adrift  by  the  gracious 
gesture  of  good  fellowship  with  a  colleague. 

Claymors  called  his  last  "cut!"  at  four  o'clock  that  Sat 
urday  afternoon.  The  last  shots  had  taken  less  time  than 
had  been  foreseen.  Mem  had  told  her  mother  that  she  might 
be  kept  at  the  studio  till  late  in  the  evening. 

The  members  of  the  company  bade  one  another  farewell 
as  after  a  pleasant  voyage.  Mem  hurried  to  remove  her 
make-up  and  put  on  civilian  clothes. 

As  she  came  down  the  steps  from  the  long  gallery  of 
dressing  rooms  she  saw  Claymore  coming  from  his  office  on 
the  ground  floor.  He  smiled. 

''Othello's  occupation's  gone.  I've  got  an  idle  afternoon 
on  my  hands.  Why  don't  we  take  a  little  motor  ride  and 
get  a  bit  of  fresh  air?" 

"I'd  better  go  home,"  Mem  faltered,  invitingly. 


SOULS    FOR   SALE  277 

"Ah,  you  can  always  go  home.  School's  over.  Let's 
play  hooky." 

"All  right!"  she  cried,  with  a  childish  eagerness  for  mis 
chief. 

She  went  with  him  to  his  car  where  it  was  parked  outside 
the  lot.  He  helped  her  in  with  a  manner  of  possession,  of 
capture.  He  sent  the  car  spinning  out  along  Washington 
Boulevard  toward  Venice.  By  winding  ways  they  reached 
the  vast  amusement  huddle  and,  passing  the  canals  that 
gave  it  its  name,  pushed  on  to  the  pleasure  streets  of  cheap 
and  noisy  merriment. 

They  loitered  awhile  on  the  sand,  but  it  seemed  a  little 
late  for  a  swim,  and  Claymore  easily  persuaded  her  to  drive 
farther  along  the  sea  road  after  an  early  dinner  at  the  Sunset 
Inn. 

When  they  had  finished  their  coffee  the  sun  was  low  and 
huge.  It  blazed  like  a  caldron  simmering  with  molten  gold, 
searing  the  eyes  and  inflaming  the  sky  about  it. 

The  Santa  Monica  Mountains  marching  down  to  the  sea 
grew  lavender  with  the  twilight.  The  Ocean  Drive  stretched 
along  a  forest  of  palms  like  huge  coconuts  dark  against  the 
gaudy  west.  Then  the  road  dropped  in  a  long  U  down  Santa 
Monica  Canon  and  out  again — a  canon  divided  between 
strange  neighbors,  a  Methodist  camp-meeting  grounds  and 
the  paradise  where  the  Uplifters  Club  gives  its  outdoor 
festivals,  pageants  of  rare  beauty,  the  forest  deeps  uncannily 
illumined  with  fuming  mists  of  many-colored  smoke. 

As  they  turned  out  again  at  the  ocean's  edge  the  sun  fell 
into  the  wide  sea  and  was  quenched,  leaving  along  the  west 
only  a  glow  of  powdered  geranium  petals,  though  the  wet 
sands  were  a  burnished-kettle  color  where  the  ripples  laved 
and  smoothed  them. 

The  automobiles  of  every  make  were  so  many  that  they 
were  almost  one  long  automobile,  or  at  least  a  chain  on  which 
they  slid  as  black  beads.  Their  lights  were  coming  out 
now  like  early  stars  pricking  a  twilit  sky. 

The  waters  grew  dull,  liquid  slate,  with  patches  of  lapis 
lazuli.  The  light  went  out  of  the  world  as  if  it  were  a  moisture 
withdrawn  from  flowers  that  drooped  and  shriveled.  The 


278  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

lavender  mountains  were  a  dull  mauve,  growing  dim  and 
listless.  The  road  sidled  along  high  cliffs  with  little  canons 
folding  them  into  long  wrinkles. 

Here  and  there  on  the  beach  knots  of  people  gathered 
about  darkling  fires,  cooking  dinner  in  a  gypsy  mood. 

Another,  more  solemn  community  was  established  here: 
a  cluster  of  Japanese  fisherf  oik — earnest  little  people  crowded 
out  of  their  own  islands  and  finding  no  welcome  in  Cali 
fornia.  But  they  toiled  on,  ignorant  of  the  articles,  stories, 
novels,  and  orations  devoted  to  their  denunciation  as  a 
menace  and  a  promise  of  war. 

The  car  rounded  headland  after  headland,  finding  always 
another  beyond.  On  one  of  these  stood  a  lighthouse  with  a 
patch  of  bright  sky  shining  through.  When  they  reached  it 
it  was  a  moving-picture  fishing  village — Inceville  once,  now 
the  R.  C.  Ranch  Studio,  an  odd  jumble  of  hollow  shells, 
English  huts,  Western  block  houses,  a  church,  a  strip  of 
castellated  walls — all  sorts  of  structures  that  a  nimble 
camera  could  present  as  parts  of  great  wholes. 

The  road  fared  on,  cutting  off  the  tip  of  one  ridge  and  leav 
ing  a  cone  the  color  of  a  vast  chocolate  drop  set  up  at  the 
ocean's  rim. 

The  next  headland  ended  in  a  bit  of  sand  where  a  few 
palm  trees  had  been  installed  to  represent  a  South  Sea  island 
vista.  The  very  mountains  in  silhouette  were  like  a  strip  of 
scenery. 

Twilight  was  smothering  the  long  and  twisted  gorge  of  the 
Topanga  when  Mem  and  Claymore  turned  their  backs  on 
the  last  glimmers  of  the  ocean. 

For  miles  and  miles  the  highway  mounted  and  writhed 
along  the  steeps  of  precipices,  hugging  the  rocks  to  let  pass  car 
after  car  with  lamps  flashing  in  front  of  blurred  passengers. 

The  road  had  been  slashed  through  walls  of  stone  or  of 
heaped  conglomerate  like  enormous  piles  of  cannon  balls. 
The  slopes,  of  increasing  depth  and  majesty,  were  clothed 
with  sage  and  stunted  trees.  Here  and  there  stood  the  tall 
white  spikes  of  the  "candles  of  God,"  the  yuccas  de  Dios, 
now  in  bloom.  They  had  a  ghostly  glimmer  where  they 
hoarded  the  last  rays  of  waning  day. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  279 

Mem's  heart  was  stabbed  with  terror  at  every  sharp  swerve 
around  a  beetling  ledge,  for  the  headlight  swung  off  down 
the  cliff,  revealing  rather  the  danger  to  be  feared  than  the 
road  to  be  followed. 

In  almost  every  bay  where  there  was  a  bit  of  space  a  motor 
had  stopped  and  drawn  close  to  the  cliffside  in  the  dark. 
It  was  easy  to  imagine  the  purpose  of  these  halts.  Each  car 
was  a  wheeled  solitude,  a  love  boat  at  anchor  in  a  stream  of 
cars  ignoring  and  ignored. 

All  over  the  world  it  was  the  custom  of  the  time  to  take 
advantage  of  such  little  solitudes.  There  was  a  vast  outcry- 
in  pulpits  and  in  editorial  columns  against  the  evil,  and  evil 
was  undoubtedly  achieved  in  immense  quantity.  It  was  no 
new  evil,  however,  but  the  ancient,  eternal  activity  that  has 
never  failed  to  find  its  opportunity  in  desert  and  in  garden, 
in  hut  and  palace,  on  porch  and  deck,  in  graveyard  and  clois 
ter,  in  cave  and  on  hillside,  in  chariot,  palanquin,  sedan,  stage 
coach,  buggy,  Victoria,  or  donkey  chaise  as  well  as  in  auto. 

It  is  an  equally  old  evil  to  accuse  the  implement  of  creat 
ing  the  power  that  makes  use  of  it,  and  would  use  another 
weapon  if  need  were. 

There  was  a  strange  influence  in  this  recurrent  mystery. 
Everywhere  lovers  were  hiding  themselves  in  conspicuous 
concealment.  Mem  felt  disgust  at  the  first  dozen,  amuse 
ment  or  contempt  for  the  next  fifty,  tolerance  for  the  next, 
and — 

Claymore  did  not  speak  of  them  or  of  anything  else.  He 
was  too  busy  twirling  the  wheel  and  gauging  the  little  dis 
tances  between  the  edge  of  the  cliff  and  the  cars  that  whizzed 
past. 

Halfway  up  the  canon  his  headlight  ransacked  a  black 
cove  between  two  headlands  and  found  no  motor  in  possession 
of  the  estuary  of  night.  And  here,  to  Mem's  dumb  astonish 
ment,  he  abruptly  checked  his  car,  swung  in  off  the  road 
against  the  wall  of  rubble,  and  stopped  short  with  a  sigh  of 
exaggerated  fatigue. 

"Well,"  he  groaned,  "this  is  a  drive!  I'll  rest  a  bit  if  you 
don't  mind.  Pretty  here,  eh?" 

From  their  cavern  of  gloom  they  looked  across  a  fathom- 


280  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

less  ravine  to  a  mountain  on  which  the  risen  moon  poured 
a  silent  Niagara.  In  the  dozing  radiance  a  creamy  shaft  of 
yucca  stood,  a  candle  blown  out  in  a  deserted  cathedral. 

The  night  air  was  of  a  strange  gentleness,  and  the  cars 
that  shot  past  threw  no  light  into  their  retreat. 

There  was  a  long,  long  silence  that  rilled  Mem  with  a  terror 
she  could  not  quite  fail  to  enjoy.  She  could  not  tell  whether 
she  heard  her  own  heartbeats  or  his,  but  excitement  was 
athrob  in  the  little  coach  that  had  brought  them  so  swiftly 
to  this  remote  seclusion. 

Claymore  was  dumb  so  long  that  Mem  had  time  to  cease 
to  be  afraid  of  what  he  would  say,  and  to  begin  to  wish  that 
he  would  get  it  said,  so  that  she  could  know  what  her  answer 
would  be. 

She  felt  a  baffling  uncertainty  of  herself.  She  could  not 
imagine  what  she  might  do  or  say.  She  had  not  had  much 
experience  of  men,  but  enough  to  know  that  before  long  he 
would  initiate  the  immemorial  procedure  that  starts  with 
an  arm  adventuring  about  a  waist  and  a  voyage  after  a  kiss. 

She  told  herself  that  the  only  right  and  proper  thing  to  do 
would  be  to  resist,  protest,  forbid,  and  prevent  at  any  cost 
the  profanation  of  her  sacred  integrity.  If  necessary,  she 
must  fight,  scratch,  scream,  escape,  run  away,  appeal  for 
help  to  any  passer-by,  or,  as  a  last  resort,  leap  over  the  cliff 
and  die  for  honor's  sake. 

But  who  was  that  She  and  who  was  that  Herself  that  told 
each  other  so  many  things? 

Herself  told  She  that  Mr.  Claymore  could  not  be  treated 
as  an  ordinary  ruffian,  an  insolent,  outrageous  knave,  a 
fiend.  He  had  treated  her  with  most  delicate  courtesy  from 
the  first,  he  had  given  her  opportunity  for  fame  and  money, 
he  had  taught  her  his  art,  he  had  given  her  his  admiration, 
his  praise,  his  devotion,  his  mute  but  evident  affection. 

If  he  loved  her  and  revealed  his  love,  she  could  hardly 
reward  his  patient  chivalry  with  prompt  ingratitude  and  vio 
lence  and  fear.  That  would  make  her  the  insulter,  not  him. 

She  must  be  very  gentle  with  him  and  ask  him  kindly  to 
forbear  and  not  to  spoil  the  pleasant  friendship  that  she  had 
prized. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  281 

But  if  he  still  persisted  ?  He  was  sure  to  be  gentle  at  worst . 
He  would  obey  her  with  a  sigh  of  loneliness  and  his  heart 
would  grieve.  Somehow,  as  she  foreshadowed  such  an  ac 
ceptance  of  defeat,  she  could  not  but  feel  a  little  disappointed. 

Thousands  of  years  of  ancestry  had  put  it  in  her  heart 
to  enjoy  being  overpowered,  overpersuaded,  captured. 
Women  had  been  earning  their  own  livings  in  various  ways 
from  most  ancient  antiquity  and  had  never  yet  overcome 
their  eternal  tendency  to  play  their  part  in  the  immortal 
duet. 

If  Mr.  Claymore  should  propose  marriage,  that  would 
make  his  caresses  acceptable — according  to  some  canons, 
though  not  to  all.  But  he  could  not  marry  her  and  she  did 
not  want  to  marry  him.  She  did  not  want  to  marry  anybody 
just  now.  She  was  a  free  woman  in  a  free  country. 

She  was  not  free,  however,  from  the  witchery  of  this 
night,  this  dream,  the  vast  yearning  of  this  mountainous 
beauty.  She  was  not  free  of  the  disaster  of  desire,  the  hunger 
to  be  embraced  and  kissed  and  whispered  to,  the  need  to  be 
kept  warm  in  the  cold  loneliness  of  the  world. 

But  her  training  kept  telling  her  that  only  a  wicked  man 
of  wicked  aims  could  have  brought  her  here  for  the  damna 
tion  of  her  soul,  the  temptation  of  her  flesh,  and  all  the 
infernal  risks  involved. 

Still,  she  could  not  hate  him  even  in  her  imagination, 
though  she  tried.  She  could  not  denounce  him  for  what  he 
had  not  yet  attempted,  and  she  could  not  quite  despise 
herself  for  not  being  unwilling  that  he  should  show  a  little 
courage. 

Besides,  what  a  hypocrite  she  would  be  to  protest  and 
rebuke  him  for  sullying  her  honor  when  she  had  none! 
Who  was  she  to  be  indignant  because  a  man  asked  her  for  a 
kiss?  How  could  she  honestly  deceive  him  by  pretending 
innocence?  How  could  she  undeceive  him  by  confessing 
her  wicked  past  ? 

Her  thoughts  spun  giddily  in  her  mind,  all  entangled  with 
a  skein  of  romantic  threads.  She  was  young  and  pretty 
and  time  was  wasting  her  flowerly  graces.  Some  one  ought 

to  cull  them  while  they  bloomed. 
19 


282  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

While  she  debated  with  herself,  as  doubtless  innumerable 
women  have  debated  with  themselves  in  like  plights,  Clay 
more's  own  mind  was  a  chaos  of  equally  ancient  platitudes 
of  a  man's  philosophy. 

At  length  he  found  the  courage  or  the  cruelty  to  slip  his 
arm  about  Mem's  waist  and  to  draw  her  close  to  him.  He 
was  almost  more  alarmed  than  delighted  to  find  that  she 
hardly  resisted  at  all. 

He  took  her  hands  in  his  and  whispered,  "Your  poor 
little  hands  are  cold!"  Then  he  kissed  them  with  cold  lips 
that  he  lifted  at  once  to  hers  and  found  them  warm  and 
strangely  like  a  rose  against  his  mouth. 

He  was  as  much  amazed  as  if  hers  were  the  first  lips  he 
had  ever  kissed — as  if  he  had  just  invented  kissing.  Then 
in  a  frenzy  of  wonder  he  closed  her  in  his  arms  with  all  his 
power.  He  did  not  know  that  the  wheel  bruised  her  side, 
and  neither  did  she.  But  she  forgot  to  debate  her  duty  or 
to  think  of  her  soul.  She  thought  only  of  the  rapture  of  this 
communion,  and  her  arms  stole  round  his  neck  and  she 
clenched  him  with  all  the  power  of  her  arms. 

As  fire  drives  out  fire,  so  evil  evil.  There  was  an  evil 
flourishing  then  with  an  unheard-of  fury — a  wave,  a  tidal 
wave  of  crime,  of  murder,  theft,  violence  of  every  sort. 

The  highways  and  the  houses  of  the  world  were  gone  mad 
with  the  enterprises  of  robbery.  Nobody  was  safe  at  home 
or  abroad,  in  palace  or  hovel,  shop  or  mail  car.  Millions  on 
millions  of  treasure  were  being  carried  off  by  thieves.  Theft 
was  ubiquitous.  On  one  of  the  roads  of  Los  Angeles,  a 
month  or  two  before,  a  couple  locked  in  each  other's  arms 
had  been  challenged  by  a  thug  with  a  gun.  He  had  robbed 
both  man  and  girl,  then  carried  the  girl  off  in  his  car  and 
later  flung  her  outraged  body  down  at  the  side  of  the  road 
and  left  her.  When  the  police  had  traced  him  and  jailed 
him  he  had  fought  with  such  fury  that  they  had  to  kill  him 
after  he  had  killed  one  guard  and  wounded  another. 

It  was  a  sorry  time  when  thieves  did  not  respect  thieves 
and  when  even  illicit  love  was  not  safe  from  criminal  inter 
ference. 

Mem,   swooning  she  knew  not  where  or  whither,   was 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  283 

awakened  from  her  mad  rapture  by  a  low  voice  across  her 

shoulder. 

"Sorry  to  interrupt  you,  folks,  but  I  need  your  money. " 
She  turned  and  found  herself  blinded  by  the  glare  from  a 

motor  halted  at  a  little  distance.     Dazzled  as  she  was,  she 

could  see  the  gaunt  hand  that  held  before  her  a  black  pistol 

with  a  glint  outlining  its  ugly  muzzle. 

She  whirled  and  stared  into  the  staring  eyes  of  Claymore. 

It  was  not  fear,  but  an  infinite  disgust,  that  she  saw  there, 

as  his  arms  left  off  embracing  her  and  rose  slowly  into  the 

shameful  posture  of  abject  surrender. 


CHAPTER  XLI 

/^>LAYMORE  was  sane  enough  to  attempt  no  resistance, 
\^s  though  he  almost  perished  of  chagrin.  He  endured  the 
insolence  of  the  masked  stranger  who  thrust  his  free  hand 
into  every  pocket,  twisted  the  watch  from  the  chain,  stole 
the  chain  and  a  wallet  and  the  loose  silver,  and  cursed 
because  there  was  no  more  to  steal. 

Claymore  had  next  to  witness  the  rifling  of  Mem's  person, 
the  clutching  for  earrings  that  were  not  there,  the  groping 
about  her  bosom  for  a  brooch,  the  wrenching  of  her  one 
poor  perjurous  wedding  ring  from  her  finger,  the  snatching 
of  her  wrist  bag  from  her  arm. 

The  blackguard  had  the  venom  to  say: 

"I'd  ought  to  bean  yous  both  for  not  havin*  somethin' 
fit  to  pinch.  You  ain't  worth  the  wear  and  tear  on  me 
conscience." 

He  held  his  clubbed  pistol  over  Claymore's  head  a  moment, 
then  forbore  to  strike,  and  dropped  from  the  step  with  a 
last  warning. 

"Sit  pretty  now  and  keep  'em  up  till  I  git  goin'  or  I'll — " 

His  car  shot  round  the  curve,  but  they  sat  petrified  for  a 
time.  In  the  black  dark  he  might  be  lurking  still. 

But  at  length  Claymore  brought  down  his  aching  arms. 
They  were  too  much  ashamed  of  themselves  to  return  to 
their  late  post  about  Mem's  shoulders. 

Claymore  was  afraid  to  speak  lest  he  begin  to  sob.  He 
started  the  car  and  turned  back  down  the  canon. 

It  was  another  realm  from  the  one  they  had  ascended  in 
such  romance.  The  enchantment  was  sardonic  now;  the 
majesty  was  a  Brocken  ribaldry;  the  dim  yuccas  sarcastic 
candles  of  a  black  Sabbath. 

The  sea  waited  for  the  road  wriggling  toward  it  reluc 
tantly,  in  an  infinite  laughter  of  contempt. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  285 

Claymore  spoke  when  the  silence  grew  unbearable: 

"I  tried  to  see  something  in  that  dog's  eyes  or  his  manner 
that  I  could  identify  him  by,  but  I  couldn't." 

"Were  you  thinking  of  describing  him  to  the  police?'* 
Mem  asked. 

"God,  no!  I  just  want  to  beat  him  to  death  privately. 
We  can't  afford  to  start  explaining  how  we  happened  to  be 
there." 

It  was  a  little  too  crass  to  word.  Mem  blushed  in  the  dark. 
It  was  shameful  to  have  gone  on  such  an  errand.  It  was 
somehow  a  little  more  shameful  to  have  been  thwarted  and 
frustrated.  A  perverse  remorse  filled  their  souls  with  con 
fusion  ;  a  remorse  because  of  a  wrong  remorse,  a  disgust  for 
an  unaccepted  temptation  and  for  being  so  temptable. 


CHAPTER  XLII 

A  WOMAN  never  quite  forgives  a  man  for  not  dying  for 
her  at  the  first  opportunity.  She  probably  never  quite 
forgives  him  for  dying,  either. 

So  the  clever  man  evades  the  situation  where  a  choice  is 
required,  as  the  virtuous  man  evades  temptation  while  it  is 
yet  afar  off. 

For  weeks  afterward  Mem  shuddered  at  the  picture  of 
what  would  have  happened  if  Claymore  had  attacked  the 
footpad  and  been  shot  to  death.  She  would  have  been  left 
alone  in  the  titanic  labyrinth  of  Topanga  Canon  with  a  dead 
body  to  explain  and  her  presence  there  to  excuse.  Yet  it 
was  not  quite  satisfactory  that  he  should  survive  after 
surrender. 

She  was  acquiring  a  habit  of  translating  life  into  scenarios 
and  continuities  of  ingenious  complication  and  more  or  less 
thrill,  and  she  spent  days  and  nights  juggling  with  possible 
conclusions  to  this  adventure. 

She  had  been  dizzy  with  the  swirl  of  Claymore's  lovestorm 
and  his  inarticulate  demands,  when  the  gruff  demand  of 
the  thug  shivered  her  whole  being  as  a  boat  that  scuds  before 
a  gale  and  rounds  a  headland  is  smitten  with  an  opposite 
blast. 

The  road,  returning  along  the  sea,  was  more  populous 
than  before  with  dark  cars  stranded  in  shadow.  In  the  dis 
tance  Venice  with  its  countless  lights  lay  like  a  constellation 
fallen  in  a  heap  upon  the  ocean's  edge. 

When  they  reached  it  it  was  a  cheap  tinsel  affair  darkly 
crowded.  They  left  it  and  turned  into  Washington  Boule 
vard,  winding  toward  Los  Angeles.  Vast  stretches  of  dark 
field  were  broken  by  brilliantly  lighted  sheds  where  fruits 
and  melons  were  for  sale,  now  and  then  a  roadside  tavern, 
now  and  then  a  moving-picture  studio. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  287 

The  Green  Mill  was  eerie  with  green  wheels  studded  with 
green  bulbs.  Dancing  was  the  chief  industry  there. 

Inside  the  classic  portico  of  the  Goldwyn  Studio  work 
was  evidently  going  on,  for  the  huge  lot  was  alight.  The 
Virginian  mansion  of  the  Ince  Studio  dreamed  in  snowy 
beauty.  A  little  farther  rose  the  curious  whimsy  of  the 
Willat  Studio  with  its  fantastic  architecture;  next  were 
the  long  buildings  where  Harold  Lloyd  made  his  comedies. 

They  crossed  Wilshire  into  Hollywood  through  a  dark 
forest  of  oil  derricks  invading  the  very  heart  of  the  thronged 
bungalows. 

Claymore,  brooding  deeply  in  his  earnest  soul,  felt  that 
he  owed  Mem  some  atonement.  He  meant  it  nobly,  but  it 
sounded  crude  when  he  checked  the  car  in  front  of  her  little 
home  and  took  her  hand  and  said : 

"If  you  will  let  me  marry  you,  I'll  see  that  my  wife 
divorces  me." 

These  divorces  of  convenience  marked  the  new-fashioned 
way  of  accomplishing  an  old-fashioned  righteousness.  He 
wanted  to  make  her  "an  honest  woman." 

But  the  times  had  passed  for  that.  Woman  had  come  into 
the  right  to  lose  her  own  soul  on  her  own  responsibility. 
No  man  can  make  her  an  honest  woman  by  any  deed  of 
his. 

Mem  laughed  nervously. 

"No,  thanks!"  It  was  as  uninspired  as  possible,  but  then 
it  is  not  easy  to  make  a  brilliant  answer  to  a  stupid  sugges 
tion.  She  felt  that  she  must  improve  on  it  a  bit,  but  she 
helped  it  little  when  she  added:  "Just  as  much  obliged. 
Goodnight!" 

She  left  him  and  went  to  face  her  mother.  She  had  not 
the  courage  to  tell  of  the  robbery.  She  covered  the  naked 
ness  of  her  ringless  finger  with  her  other  hand  and,  yawning 
ostentatiously,  sneaked  off  to  bed. 

And  that  was  the  end  of  her  love  story  with  Claymore. 
It  had  been  a  success  in  no  respect  as  a  love  story.  But  as  an 
education  it  had  been  invaluable. 

He  had  taught  her  to  know  herself  and  the  volcanic 
emotions  within  her,  and  how  to  release  them  at  command. 


288  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

She  was  far  from  being  a  great  or  a  complete  artist,  but  she 
had  the  ambition  to  be  one;  she  had  some  of  the  resources, 
and  she  knew  what  the  others  must  be. 

It  seemed  an  ingratitude,  almost  a  treachery,  to  take 
Clajinore's  inspiration  and  tuition  and  give  him  in  return 
only  a  few  kind  words  and  an  evidence  of  her  frailty  before 
temptation. 

But  while  she  could  command  herself  to  weep  and  to  throb 
with  enacted  love,  she  could  not  scold  herself  into  a  genuine 
passion. 

She  felt  degraded  in  the  eyes  of  Claymore,  and  hoped  that 
she  would  not  see  him  again  until  the  memory  had  blurred. 
But  she  was  still  more  tormented  with  the  problem  of  the 
thug  who  had  found  her  in  Claymore's  embrace. 

She  would  never  know  who  he  was,  because  his  face  had 
been  masked.  But  he  had  studied  her.  He  would  know  her 
anywhere,  and  if  she  became  famous  he  would  sneer  as  he 
saw  her  published  face.  He  would  sneer,  and  he  would 
doubtless  talk. 


CHAPTER  XLIII 

THAT  was  a  dismal  night  in  Mem's  chronicles.  She  was 
humiliated  before  her  own  soul  in  a  dozen  ways  and 
before  the  eyes  of  her  best  friend  and  the  anonymous,  faceless 
raider. 

She  could  not  sleep  her  accusing  self  away.  The  critic 
within  her  soul  kept  condemning  her,  and  nothing  was  more 
odious  than  the  fact  that  she  had  been  caught. 

Also,  she  could  not  sleep  for  the  fever  in  her  parched 
eyes.  The  last  day  at  the  studio  had  been  spent  in  the  furious 
circle  of  the  lights.  They  had  almost  burnt  her  vision  away, 
and  she  had  been  unable  to  face  them  in  one  of  the  final  close- 
ups  without  gushing  tears  and  stabbing  pain. 

During  the  night  she  had  a  mild  onset  of  "Kliegl  eyes" 
and  had  nightmares  of  blindness.  Her  career  would  be 
blasted  at  once.  Her  terrors  added  to  her  repentances  and 
her  anguish  made  slumber  impossible. 

As  she  lay  staring  into  the  dark  the  windows  and  the  fur 
niture  began  to  wake  from  the  black  and  take  on  definition. 
The  world  in  the  dawn  was  exactly  like  the  film  as  she  had 
seen  it  developed  in  the  dungeons  of  the  laboratory,  a 
sudden  faint  revelation  of  outlines,  a  gradual  clarity,  and 
finally  all  the  details. 

She  rose  wearily  from  her  bed,  flung  on  a  wrap,  and  stole 
to  the  window.  The  little  garden  and  the  orange  tree  were 
being  developed  likewise  by  the  chemistry  of  the  sunrise. 

She  felt  an  impulse  to  walk  about,  and,  thrusting  her 
bare  feet  into  slippers,  she  went  through  the  door  as  stealthily 
as  an  escaping  thief. 

The  morning  was  as  yet  only  a  paler  moonlight.  She  was 
surprised  to  find  the  mountains  missing  from  the  horizon.  It 
seemed  odd  that  a  sierra  should  be  removed  overnight.  It  was 
a  mist  that  hid  them — so  frail  a  thing  to  conceal  such  bulks! 


290  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

As  she  watched,  the  veil  was  withdrawn  into  nothingness. 
The  mountains  rolled  up  their  mighty  billows.  They  were 
as  if  created  anew  by  the  original  edict  or  by  that  long 
squeeze  the  geologists  imagine. 

As  they  emerged  sullenly  from  the  void,  the  rest  of  the 
world  opened  shop.  Flowers  began  to  waken ;  vines  to  take 
thought  of  further  explorations;  birds  began  to  whet  their 
beaks,  little  butchers  sharpening  their  knives  for  the  market. 

Somewhere  a  bird  was  singing.  It  is  good  poetry  to 
praise  the  song  of  birds.  But  this  one  sounded  like  a  squeak 
ing  wheel.  Yet  it  would  be  ridiculous  to  liken  an  ungreased 
wheel  to  the  pipe  of  a  half -awakened  bird. 

In  a  vacant  lot  at  the  back,  rabbits  were  sitting  up  and 
shivering  their  noses  in  a  posture  of  amazed  stupidity. 
Across  the  walks  and  the  grass  little  herds  of  snails  were 
returning  to  their  corrals.  They  had  the  look  of  having 
been  out  all  night  and  their  knapsacks  were  tipsily  awry. 
And  they  left  shining  wakes  wherever  they  went,  as  drunk 
ards  leave  footprints  in  the  snow. 

The  flowers  were  putting  on  their  colors  like  robes,  or  like 
make-up  that  night  had  removed.  It  was  the  light  that 
restored  their  beauty  of  hue. 

Light!  they  were  its  creatures  and  its  voices.  And 
she  was  a  child  of  light.  Darkness  was  her  death,  and  all  her 
speech  was  reflected  radiance  from  the  sun  or  from  some  of  the 
little  suns  that  tiny  mankind  had  devised  for  its  amusement 
and  convenience. 

In  the  yard  next  door  blackbirds  were  breakfast  hunting. 
She  noted  that  each  glistening  male  was  nagged  and  bullied 
by  a  fat  brown  female.  When  he  found  a  worm  she  ran  and 
took  it  away  from  him.  When  he  did  not  find  one  she  nipped 
him  with  her  bill  or  made  a  pathetic  racket.  If  he  tried  to 
swallow  one  unobserved  she  made  him  disgorge  it.  If  she 
stumbled  over  one  as  she  waddled,  she  kept  it  herself.  Her 
motto  seemed  to  be  the  old  phrase  Mem  had  heard  as  a 
child:  "What's  yours  's  mine;  what's  mine's  m'own." 

No  wonder  the  males  were  so  sleek  and  crisply  alert.  No 
wonder  their  womenfolk  were  so  obese  and  petulant. 

Mem  thought  she  saw  the  old-fashioned  housewife  in  the 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  291 

female  blackbird.  She  grew  plump  on  the  toil  of  her  smart 
husband,  and  contributed  little  but  an  appetite  and  a  number 
of  new  beaks  for  him  to  feed. 

She  was  glad  that  she  would  not  be  such  a  woman.  She 
would  find  her  own  food  and  pay  her  way,  and  she  would  pay 
it  handsomely.  She  filled  her  breast  with  a  deep  draught 
of  this  pride.  She  had  been  wicked  once  by  inclination,  but 
then  she  had  been  wicked  as  an  old-fashioned  home-keeping 
girl.  Now  her  wickedness  was  her  own,  at  least,  and  she 
would  not  let  Claymore  take  the  blame;  for  when  you 
take  the  blame  you  take  the  credit,  too,  and  the  control. 

She  would  be  no  man's  chattel  to  make  or  mar. 

The  blackbirds  gave  her  a  contempt  for  the  ideal  woman 
of  old,  an  exultance  over  being  a  real  woman  of  new. 

She  stood  and  watched  the  lustrous  creatures  for  a  long 
while.  Vance  Thompson  had  squandered  some  of  the  opu 
lence  of  his  style  on  the  blackbirds  of  Los  Angeles.  Knowing 
the  world  as  few  men  know  it,  he  gave  the  city  supreme  praise, 
above  Algiers,  Tunis,  Monte  Carlo,  or  Palermo,  "And  yet," 
he  wrote,  "I've  fallen  in  love  with  the  birds.  Especially 
those  grave  and  beautiful  blackbirds.  There  are  a  dozen 
of  them  on  my  lawn — I  can  see  them  from  the  window.  The 
gentlemen  wear  blackly  purple  cassocks  and  the  ladies  are 
dressed  in  soft  nun-colored  brown.  And  they  are  so  friendly, 
so  clean-stepping,  so  busy  and  blithe,  that  they  look  like 
predestined  citizens  of  Los  Angeles.  Symbols  and  types. 
Every  city  has  its  birds.  Venice  has  its  pigeons  of  Saint 
Mark's;  Moscow  its  crows,  those  secular  monks  of  the 
Kremlin;  Paris  has  its  sparrows,  and  Stockholm  its  swans — 
ah,  those  black  swans  of  the  Djugarden! — and  your  Cali 
fornia  blackbird  is  the  bird,  ideal  and  appointed,  of  Los 
Angeles." 

Musing  upon  the  feathered  bipeds,  the  high-stepping 
Othellos  and  the  drooping  Desdemonas  of  birddom,  Mem's 
mind  was  soothed  of  its  fevers.  But  her  body  grew  chill. 
Her  bare  ankles  brushed  a  dewy  leaf  and  she  fled  into  the 
house.  The  light  scourged  her  wounded  eyes. 


CHAPTER  XLIV 

TWO  days  later  she  began  work  with  Tom  Holby's  com 
pany  in  a  new  studio — a  great  establishment  where  one 
could  rent  space,  scenery,  all  or  any  portion  of  a  production 
from  manuscripts  to  distribution. 

A  number  of  the  farthest-famed  stars  occasionally  made 
pictures  there — Douglas  Fairbanks  and  Mary  Pickf  ord,  Betty 
Compson,  and  many  another. 

Mem  had  been  lent  out  to  Holby.  If  she  were  a  slave, 
she  was  at  least  received  as  a  captured  Circassian  princess 
might  be  received  by  a  sultan  who  had  bought  her  at  a  high 
price. 

When  she  appeared  on  the  lot  Holby  greeted  her  in  person. 
He  led  her  into  his  office  and  described  the  part  she  was  to 
play,  read  her  the  big  scenes. 

He  bemoaned  the  artificiality  and  triteness  of  the  plot. 
It  was  warmed  over  like  funeral  baked  meats.  He  had  longed 
to  do  a  story  adapted  from  W.  J.  Locke's  novel  Septimus. 

Holby  had  wanted  to  play  the  simple  Septimus.  Mem, 
who  had  read  no  novels  at  all  till  recently,  was  horribly  illiter 
ate  in  famous  names.  But  she  was  wondrously  stirred  by 
this  story  as  Holby  told  it: 

Septimus  loved  a  girl  who  merely  liked  him.  She  loved 
another  man — loved  him  "too  well,"  as  the  curious  saying 
is.  He  "betrayed"  her,  as  another  curious  saying  is,  and 
when  he  had  gone  beyond  her  reach  she  found  that  she  was 
to  become  a  mother — still  using  the  stock  phrases. 

Holby  noted  that  Mem  was  all  ashiver  over  the  situa 
tion.  He  never  dreamed  that  it  had  been  her  own,  her  very 
own.  He  thought  that  he  had  frightened  her  prudery  and 
he  tried  to  soften  his  phrases  still  more. 

But  she  was  uncontrollably  agitated  when  he  went  on 
with  the  plot  and  told  how  Septimus,  for  all  his  innocence, 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  293 

discovered  the  cause  of  the  girl's  dismay — and,  knowing  all, 
offered  to  marry  her  so  that  her  child  might  have  a  name,  so 
that  the  girl  he  idolized  might  not  be  driven  to  desperation. 

"Are  there  men  like  that ? "  Mem  gasped. 

Holby  looked  at  her  and  interpreted  her  question  as  a 
cynicism. 

"Oh  yes,"  he  answered,  earnestly.  "There  must  be  lots 
of  men  like  that.  If  I  loved  a  girl  and  found  her  in  such  a 
plight,  I  think  I  would — I  hope  I  would — offer  to  help  her 
through  it.  It  wouldn't  be  much  of  a  love  that  would  die 
at  such  a  situation,  would  it?" 

Mem  fell  to  thinking.  A  ferocious  temptation  assailed 
her  to  confess  to  Tom  Holby  that  she  had  been  such  a  girl 
herself,  but  had  never  dreamed  that  such  a  man  existed. 

Perhaps  when  Tom  Holby  had  courted  her  a  little  there  in 
Palm  Canon,  if  she  had  not  rebuffed  and  despised  him,  but 
had  told  him  the  truth,  he  might  have  offered  her  his  famous 
name;  they  might  have  been  married  and  she  might  now 
be  sitting  with  him  in  their  own  home  with  a  living  child 
at  her  quick  breast.  The  vision  shook  her  like  a  blast  of 
hot  desert  wind.  Her  baby  had  never  seen  the  world.  She 
had  never  seen  its  face.  Where  had  its  soul  waited  and 
whither  had  it  returned?  Had  it  joined  its  father  in  that 
strange  overgrave  realm? 

For  a  few  mad  moments  Mem  longed  to  be  a  wife  and 
mother  so  insanely  that  she  could  hardly  check  the  cry  of 
protest  at  the  denial.  She  forgot  her  brave  independences 
of  the  early  morning,  her  pride  in  her  artistic  self-sufficiency. 
She  wanted  to  be  an  "old-fashioned  woman,"  to  be  fed  by 
her  husband  and  to  feed  his  children. 

But  while  the  tempest  was  raging  inside  her  soul  she  was 
so  remote  from  her  body  that  her  face  had  not  disclosed  her 
thoughts  at  all. 

What  Tom  Holby  saw  was  a  dreary  smile,  which  he  mis 
read  as  mild  disdain  for  such  romantic  nonsense. 

When  she  spoke  at  last  she  merely  asked : 

"And  why  didn't  you  play  Septimus  on  the  screen,  as  you 
say  you  would  have  done  in  real  life? " 

"The  censors!"  he  snarled.     "They've  got  everybody 


294  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

frightened  to  death.  In  Pennsylvania  and  other  states  you 
can't  even  refer  to  approaching  maternity.  The  producers 
don't  want  to  make  pictures  with  a  big  market  cut  off  in 
advance,  so  we've  got  to  be  more  prudish  than  a  Sunday- 
school  library. 

"The  censors  seem  to  feel  that  if  they  keep  the  motion- 
picture  audiences  from  even  learning  that  babies  are  born 
of  their  mothers  a  great  blow  will  be  struck  for  morality. 
The  books  and  magazines  and  newspapers  can  talk  of  twilight 
sleep  and  birth  control  and  everything,  but  the  poor  movies 
can't  even  show  a  young  wife  sewing  on  baby  clothes. 

"But  let's  not  talk  of  censorship.  I  froth  at  the  mouth 
every  time  I  think  of  the  shame  and  the  tyranny  and  the 
asininity  of  it.  The  story  of  Septimus  would  have  been 
beautiful.  It  is  as  clean  as  the  parable  in  the  Bible  about 
the  woman  taken  in  adultery,  and  that's  given  to  little  girls 
to  read  and  it's  preached  in  all  the  pulpits.  But  on  the 
screen  it  would  immediately  send  all  the  audience  out  to 
get  into  trouble.  Anyway,  I  can't  do  the  story  and  we've 
had  to  cook  up  this  mess  of  denaturated  realism  we're  going 
to  do.  But,  Lord !  how  I  should  have  loved  to  play  Septimus 
and  have  you  play  the  pitiful  little  girl  I  would  have  married. 
In  the  story  she  married  Septimus  and  came  to  love  him  so 
dearly  that  when  she  met  the  other  man  she  hated  him." 

He  fell  into  a  silent  while  and  Mem  dreamed  tremendous 
dreams,  vain  and  already  frustrated,  but  beautiful  with  all 
the  elegy  of  the  might-have-been. 

People  make  love  unconsciously  at  times  and  in  the  truest 
courtships  never  a  word  is  spoken.  Two  souls  travel  mystic 
gardens  together  and  come  to  deep  understandings  without 
the  exchange  of  a  syllabled  thought. 

Mem  was  so  wooed  by  Holby.  The  mere  brooding  upon 
him  as  a  lover,  a  husband,  a  protector  who  would  once  have 
solved  an  ugly  problem  into  beauty,  presented  him  to  Mem 
in  a  light  of  compelling  warmth. 

She  tried  to  shake  off  the  spell,  but  from  now  on  there  was 
an  aureole  of  chivalrous  self -sacrifice  about  Tom  Holby  that 
changed  him  altogether  from  the  flippant,  too  polite,  and 
far  too  popular  idol  of  foolish  girls  that  she  had  rated  him. 


SOULS   FOR   SALE  295 

All  through  the  taking  of  that  picture  Mem  watched  him 
as  from  a  lattice  that  hid  her  from  him,  but  disclosed  him  to 
her  in  the  kindliest  sun. 

The  picture  had  to  be  made  in  record  time  because  the 
producers  had  a  limited  capital  and  an  unlimited  experience 
of  the  disastrous  expense  of  leisureliness. 

The  director,  Kendrick,  was  a  slave  driver,  a  worshiper 
of  schedules.  He  demanded  that  the  people  £e  on  the  set 
made  up,  costumed,  coiffed,  and  wide  awake,  so  that  the 
cameras  might  begin  to  grind  at  nine  sharp.  But  he  was  not 
so  punctual  about  letting  the  weary  troupers  knock  off  at 
five.  He  kept  them  often  till  nearly  seven. 

When  Mem's  day  of  toil  was  over  she  was  so  footsore, 
so  soulsore,  and  had  seen  so  much  of  Tom  Holby  and  his 
manufactured  love,  that  she  had  no  inclination  to  see  him  of 
evenings,  and  he  made  no  effort  to  see  her. 

She  crept  into  her  bed  at  nine  when  she  was  not  kept 
at  the  studio  for  night  work.  She  was  called  at  six  and 
began  the  day  with  a  long  and  dreary  building  up  of  a 
false  complexion,  layer  on  layer,  line  by  line. 

She  rarely  saw  Tom  Holby's  real  face.  He  also  was 
painted  like  an  Indian  brave. 

But  for  all  the  fatigue  and  the  artifice,  there  was  a  feeling 
of  delight  and  of  friendliness  on  the  stages.  Co-operation 
was  necessary  and  it  was  the  custom.  The  technical  prob 
lems  were  innumerable  and  their  discussions  as  scientific 
as  laboratory  debate. 

The  reward  of  rewards  was  the  rapture  of  creation.  Nearly 
all  the  members  of  the  company  would  rather  act  than  eat, 
rather  play  feigned  sorrows  than  indulge  in  real  joys.  They 
sought  for  difficult  tasks,  they  were  grateful  for  demands 
upon  their  utmost  resources.  They  sulked  only  when  their 
toil  was  diminished  or  they  were  left  out  of  a  scene  or  not 
taxed  to  their  limit. 

Mem's  affair  with  Tom  Holby  was  settling  down  into  the 
pleasant  but  drab  relationship  of  two  business  partners. 
They  were  as  friendly  already  as  an  old  married  couple  with 
out  ever  having  known  the  initiatory  rites. 

But  in  this  dull  fact  there  lurked  a  resentful,  impatient  peril. 


CHAPTER  XLV 

THERE  was  much  skylarking  on  the  set — a  childlike 
spontaneity  of  wit  and  cynicism  and  an  inexhaustible 
fascination  of  craft. 

Mem  was  becoming  something  of  a  technician.  The  me 
chanics,  the  artisanship  that  sustains  every  art,  the  alphabets 
of  expression,  the  wireless  codes  for  the  transmission  of 
emotion,  its  creation  in  a  transmitter,  its  preparation  fcr  the 
receivers — all  these  things  no  artist  can  ignore  and  succeed. 

The  more  eloquence  the  orator  feels  in  his  heart  the  more  he 
considers  his  tones.  The  more  earnest  the  writer  the  more 
piously  he  cons  his  dictionary.  The  more  glorious  the  singer 
the  more  he  studies  his  breath  control,  his  coups  de  glotte, 
his  white  notes,  his  transition  colors.  The  more  fervid  the 
composer  the  more  he  ponders  acoustics  and  tone  combina 
tions  and  the  inventions  of  new  instruments.  The  more 
eager  the  painter  the  more  he  analyzes  his  values,  the  more 
he  seeks  new  tubes,  new  brushes,  new  chemistries  of  cclor. 

Only  the  amateur,  the  dawdler,  the  dilettante  despises  his 
craft  and  depends  on  passion  or  that  egotistic  whim  which  he 
calls  inspiration. 

So  the  ambitious  actor  must  experiment  always  with  the 
tools  of  thought,  the  engines  of  suffering. 

Once  when  Mem  was  shocked  at  a  flippancy  of  Tom 
Holby's  concerning  his  art,  he  rebuked  her  earnestly: 

"You're  not  really  well  acquainted  with  your  art  unless  you 
can  joke  about  it.  What's  funnier  than  the  idea  that  being 
funny  is  not  as  serious  as  being  solemncholy?  There  was 
never  a  finer  actor  than  Nat  Goodwin,  and  I  heard  him 
say  once,  speaking  of  his  Shylock:  'I  was  great  in  the  last 
act.  I  knew  I  was  great  because  the  audience  was  weeping 
and  I  was  guying  it,  and  when  you  can  guy  a  serious  scene 
you've  got  to  be  great/  " 


SOULS   FOR    SALE  297 

Mem  began  to  understand  also,  but  slowly,  that  making 
fun  of  one's  serious  emotions  is  a  form  of  modesty,  a  cover 
ing  of  nakedness,  a  shy  retreat  behind  a  mask  of  smiles. 

She  began  to  be  able  to  talk  flippantly  of  her  art  and  to 
talk  of  it  in  trade  terms. 

One  day  when  she  was  posing  for  a  big  close-up  of  herself 
asleep,  the  director  asked  her  to  try  to  squeeze  a  tear  or  two 
through  her  great  clenched  eyelids.  She  startled  even  him 
by  saying,  with  an  elfin  earnestness: 

"What  kind  do  you  want?  One  great  big  slow  teardrop, 
or  a  lot  of  little  shiny  ones?" 

He  was  shocked,  but  he  hid  his  own  sense  of  sacrilege 
in  a  careless : 

"Give  me  one  large  tear  about  five-eighths  of  an  inch  in 
diameter. " 

"All  right,"  she  said. 

And  she  did.  It  oozed  through  her  long  lashes  and  slipped 
reluctantly  down  her  cheek  into  her  hair.  And,  knowing 
what  he  knew  of  its  control,  he  felt  his  own  eyes  wet,  and 
the  jaded  camera  man  whispered,  awesomely,  "Great!" 

In  another  scene,  where  more  tears  were  required  of  her, 
he  noted  that  while  she  waited  for  the  camera  set-up  she  had 
her  hands  gabled  at  her  lips  and  she  seemed  to  be  whispering 
to  herself. 

Curious,  he  asked,  "What  are  you  up  to  now?" 

She  gazed  at  him.  "I  was  praying  God  to  send  me  beau 
tiful  tears. " 

He  shook  his  head  and  walked  away,  gasping. 

One  afternoon  the  chief  financial  power  in  Tom  Holby's 
company  saw  Mem  pacing  up  and  down  by  herself  at  a  dis 
tance  from  the  set.  He  watched  her  and  noted  that  she 
leaned  against  a  canvas  wall  and  hid  her  head  in  her  arm. 
Her  shoulders  quivered  and  shook  with  forlorn  woe. 

His  heart  was  touched  and  he  could  not  resist  an  impulse 
to  go  to  her  and  proffer  his  sympathy  in  her  evident  grief. 
He  touched  her  on  the  arm  and  asked,  with  an  almost 
mothering  solicitude: 

"You  poor  child!    What's  the  matter?" 

She  whirled  on  him  in  surprise  and  stared  through  a  shower 
20 


298  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

of  tears.  Then  a  smile  broke  from  her  blubbering  lips  and 
she  giggled: 

"Oh,  I'm  just  getting  ready  for  a  big  crying  scene." 

He  fell  back  as  if  he  had  touched  a  serpent.  He  was  dis 
gusted  with  himself  for  making  such  a  fool  of  himself  and 
wasting  his  precious  pity  on  a  little  trickster. 

The  climax  of  Mem's  shamelessness  was  reached  one  day 
when  Robina  Teele  and  the  great  Miriam  Yore  visited  the 
studio  and  stopped  for  lunch  in  the  commissary.  Mem  was 
put  on  her  mettle  by  the  grandiose  condescension  of  Miss 
Yore  and  by  the  suspicious  jealousy  of  Robina  Teele. 

The  matter  of  tears  for  sale  came  up  and  Miss  Yore  spoke  of 
how  she  got  hers. 

"I  find  that  if  I  use  the  tone  of  voice  intentionally  which 
I  use  unintentionally  when  I  am  really  crying,  the  tears 
come.  It  may  be  just  muscle  memory  or  it  may  be  that  I 
grow  very  sorry  for  myself. " 

Robina  did  not  know  how  she  got  hers. 

"Margaret  Anglin  said  she  could  cry  at  will  over  a  fried 
egg  or  anything.  So  can  I.  I  just  imagine  the  scene  and  say 
to  myself,  '  Cry ! '  and  I  cry  till  the  director  says, '  Cut ! " 

Neither  of  the  famous  women  thought  to  ask  the  rising 
Miss  Steddon  how  she  manipulated  her  lachrymal  art.  Tom 
Holby,  feeling  that  she  was  slighted,  brought  her  into  it 
by  asking  her  her  system. 

"Prayer  and  brute  strength,"  said  Mem. 

Robina  was  in  an  assertive  mood,  and,  as  one  violinist 
might  challenge  another  to  a  concerto  or  an  orator  propose  a 
debate  to  another,  she  called  for  a  duel  of  tears.  She  thought 
she  could  send  Miss  Yore  back  to  the  grand  opera  she  had 
come  from. 

"Let's  have  a  crying  contest,"  she  said. 

"I  should  have  to  have  music, "  said  Miss  Yore. 

"Come  over  on  my  set  and  we'll  give  you  your  favorite 
tune,"  said  Holby.  He  dragged  Remember  Steddon  along, 
though  the  two  veterans  did  not  take  her  into  account. 

Holby  explained  to  the  director  that  they  were  to  have  a 
field  day  of  emotion,  and  he  consented  to  defer  the  scene  he 
was  about  to  shoot. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  299 

Miss  Yore  wanted  the  theme  of  the  "Liebestod"  played 
over  and  over.  The  wheezy  little  portable  organ  made  a  sad 
mess  of  Wagner's  braided  harmonies,  but  the  violinist  caught 
the  cry  of  the  melody. 

Robina  could  cry  best  for  "Just  a  Song  at  Twilight," 
but  she  gracefully  yielded  the  choice  of  music  to  Miss  Yore. 

Mem  had  never  heard  an  opera,  grand  or  comic.  But  the 
strangely  climbing  anguish  of  the  tune  caught  her  up  on 
its  pinions,  and  lifted  her  into  that  ether  where  the  souls  of 
imaginative  artists  fly  in  all  disguises  and  assume  all  per 
sonalities. 

The  rest  of  the  company  and  the  crew  stood  aloof  and 
watched  in  amazement  as  the  two  world-famed  stars  and  the 
rising  young  asteroid,  Mem,  began  to  war  with  their  own 
features  like  athletes  tuning  up  or  shadow-boxing. 

The  three  women  walked  apart  for  a  moment,  grimacing 
and  forcing  themselves  into  a  state  of  agony.  Robina 
achieved  the  first  sob.  She  broke  and  flung  herself  on  a  couch 
and  sobbed  aloud.  Mem  jealously  decided  that  she  was 
cheating  and  rather  looked  down  on  her  shoulder-work. 
It  was  pumpy. 

She  stared  at  Miriam  Yore,  an  ambulant  statue  of  heroic 
postures,  lifting  her  hands  to  heaven,  carrying  them  clasped 
to  her  fulsome  bosom,  and  indulging  in  the  despair  of  a 
Medea  or  a  Cornwall  princess  whose  draperies  must  also 
weep  about  her  beautifully. 

In  Mem's  eyes  Miss  Yore  was  as  stagy  as  Miss  Teele 
was  screeny.  Neither  of  them  seemed  quite  human.  Grief 
to  Mem  was  a  homely,  unlovely,  tearing,  disordering  thing. 
To  cry  gracefully  was  not  to  cry  at  all. 

She  was  the  realist,  the  small-town  girl  whose  heart  gives 
way,  whose  features  crumple,  whose  eyes  blear  and  reek 
with  bitter,  devastating  brine. 

The  onlookers  called  Robina  wonderful.  They  called 
Miss  Yore  beautiful.  They  paid  the  untimely  tribute  of 
admiration.  But  when  Remember  Steddon  abruptly  flopped 
into  a  chair  like  a  flung  rag  doll,  and  began  to  choke  and 
snivel,  to  dab  at  her  eyes  and  wrinkle  her  chin,  to  fight  and 
hate  the  spurting  tears,  to  sway  her  head  in  futile  protest, 


300  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

to  give  vent  to  ugly  little  rasping  noises  that  seemed  to  saw 
her  throat  raw  and  to  grow  extraordinarily  homely  and  pitiful, 
the  spectators  felt  a  something  familiar  out  of  their  own  child 
hood,  out  of  their  own  old  lonelinesses  and  defeats.  Their  own 
faces  puckered,  their  hearts  were  nests  of  pain,  their  eyes 
went  dank  and  were  blurred. 

They  gave  her  the  ultimate  tribute  of  sympathy  and 
echoed  her  misery. 

Miss  Teele  stopped  crying  to  stare.  Miss  Yore  ceased  her 
magnificent  stride.  Both  forgot  to  be  artists.  Before  they 
realized  that  Mem  had  not  really  broken  down  in  a  genuine 
grief  they  had  surrendered  the  battle  and  were  crying  with 
her. 

And  she,  having  set  in  motion  the  wheels  of  sorrow,  could 
not  stop  them.  There  is  so  much  to  regret  in  this  world  and  in 
any  life,  that  it  is  perilous  to  start  the  tears  rolling,  lest 
they  crush  the  soul. 

Her  triumph  astonished  Mem  and  all  the  witnesses. 
But  she  was  almost  destroyed  with  her  own  victory.  She 
was  sick  and  ashamed  of  the  blasphemy  of  her  c,buse  of  such 
holy  things  as  tears. 

Afterward,  however,  she  could  laugh  again,  and  when 
Tom  Holby  told  her  that  she  had  wiped  the  earth  up  with 
her  two  rivals  it  was  a  thrilling  thing  to  hear. 

The  contest  was  the  talk  of  the  whole  studio,  and  the 
publicity  man  sent  broadcast,  to  the  enlargement  of  Mem's 
fame,  her  brilliant  etude  in  tears. 

It  was  all  working  toward  her  glory  as  a  mistress  of 
emotions. 


CHAPTER  XLVI 

THE  director,  Kendrick,  was  in  a  desperate  frenzy  to  com 
plete  the  picture.  The  hard  times  were  reducing  the  in 
comes  of  the  producers  and  exhibitors  at  a  terrifying  rate. 

The  apathy  that  accompanies  all  financial  depressions 
sickened  the  public  appetite  for  everything.  The  critics 
were  saying  that  the  emptiness  of  the  theaters  was  due  to  the 
stupidity  of  the  plays,  but  just  as  stupid  plays  had  prospered 
mightily  when  the  boom  was  at  its  height.  The  critics  were 
likewise  saying  that  the  moving  pictures  were  unworthy  of 
the  patronage  they  were  not  getting.  But  the  fault  was  with 
the  public  dyspepsia  and  not  with  the  cooks. 

In  any  case,  the  vast  cinematic  industry  was  in  as  serious  a 
plight  as  the  steel,  the  copper,  the  lumber,  and  all  the  other 
giant  industries. 

In  spite  of  the  ferocious  slashes  in  salaries,  wages,  sets, 
most  of  the  studios  were  declaring  holidays  of  a  month  or 
more. 

The  orders  had  gone  forth  to  rush  the  Holby  picture  to  a 
conclusion.  The  big  night-storm  scenes  had  been  scheduled 
for  the  final  takes.  They  would  appear  early  in  the  story, 
but  too  many  accidents  might  happen  if  they  were  shot  in 
sequence.  It  would  be  lamentable  if  any  of  the  actors  were 
injured  at  any  time,  but  it  would  be  disastrous  to  have  an 
arm  or  a  head  broken  or  a  case  of  pneumonia  in  the  middle 
of  the  work.  It  had  happened.  Actors  occasionally  died 
with  extravagant  inopportunity,  or  broke  bones,  or  marred 
countenances  that  could  not  be  matched  or  replaced.  The 
expense  of  some  of  these  mishaps  was  appalling,  with  an 
overhead  of  two  thousand  dollars  a  day. 

On  the  final  morning  the  first  scenes  were  begun  promptly 
at  nine.  Kendrick  promised  to  let  the  company  go  at  three 
to  rest  for  the  all-night  grind,  but  delays  of  every  sort 


3o2  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

occurred.  A  light  would  flicker  during  an  important  scene. 
In  a  close-up  one  of  the  characters  would  swerve  outside 
the  narrow  space  allotted. 

When  the  actors  were  again  attuned  and  the  director 
was  impatient  to  cry,  "Camera!"  one  of  the  camera  men 
would  find  that  he  had  not  film  enough  and  a  new  magazine 
must  be  fetched. 

Such  inevitable,  incessant  delays  were  peculiarly  irritat 
ing  to  a  company  on  the  razor  edge  of  emotion,  but  there 
was  rarely  an  outburst.  Emotion,  being  property,  was 
conserved.  There  is  probably  no  class  of  people  who  act 
so  rarely  as  actors. 

The  general  opinion  to  the  contrary  is  like  most  general 
opinions  based  on  ignorance. 

At  three  o'clock  there  were  still  many  scenes  unshot. 
The  work  continued  and  it  was  not  until  half  past  seven 
that  the  day's  work  was  done.  The  "rushes"  of  the 
day  before  were  still  to  be  inspected  in  the  projection  room, 
whither  the  company  scampered. 

It  was  eight  o'clock  before  anyone  could  stop  for  dinner. 
The  actors  were  not  considered,  but  the  work  crews  had 
to  be  humored.  Some  of  them  were  members  of  unions  and 
it  was  a  legal  peril  also  to  keep  extra  people  at  work  more 
than  eight  hours  in  a  day. 

Tom  Holby  and  Mem  sought  their  dinner  in  a  little 
shack  near  the  studio.  They  perched  on  stools  and  ate 
T-bone  steaks,  fried  potatoes,  doughnuts,  and  coffee  with 
the  voracity  of  longshoremen. 

At  nine  they  went  to  the  first  of  the  sets.  The  Californian 
night  was  black  and  bitter  cold.  The  night  in  the  story 
was  one  of  tempest  and  battle.  Tom  Holby  must  run  an 
automobile  into  a  ditch  and  make  a  desperate  war  against 
four  brutes  who  were  instructed  to  put  up  a  good  fight. 

The  public  would  not  stand  a  mock  engagement.  Fists 
had  to  land.  Heads  had  to  rock,  and  when  a  man  fell  he 
must  fall.  He  must  go  over  with  a  crash  wherever  the  blow 
sent  him. 

The  actors  wanted  it  so. 


SOULS    FOR   SALE  303 

Tom  Holby  expected  to  end  the  night  bleeding,  bruised, 
tattered,  and  mud  smeared.  He  had  cracked  many  a  bone 
and  lost  a  tooth  or  two  on  such  gala  occasions;  and  once 
he  had  splintered  the  bones  of  his  right  hand  when  his  fist 
missed  the  face  it  was  aimed  at  and  struck  the  stone 
beneath  it. 

Mem's  share  in  the  hurricane  was  to  run  through  the 
wildest  of  the  storm  and  bring  rescue. 

Such  scenes  in  the  movies  are  often  railed  at  as  cheap 
sensationalism,  yet  they  are  heroic  art.  In  an  epic  poem, 
or  a  classic  drama,  they  are  accounted  the  height  of  achieve 
ment.  Winslow  Homer's  high  seas,  Conrad's  gorgeous 
simooms,  are  lauded  as  triumphs  of  genius.  The  author 
rifles  the  dictionary  and  guts  his  thesaurus,  the  painter 
wrecks  his  palette  and  his  brushes,  and  is  celebrated  as  of 
the  grand  school.  When  the  moving-picture  geniuses  like 
wise  exhaust  a  vocabulary  of  mechanical  effects,  and  spread 
before  the  world  visions  of  beautiful  drama,  the  critics  pass 
by  with  averted  gaze. 

Mem  had  five  scenes  to  dash  through.  Her  pilgrimage 
was  to  be  a  sort  of  "Pippa  Passes,"  but  she  was  not  to  go 
singing;  she  was  to  be  stormed  upon  as  Sebald  and  Ottima 
were. 

Each  bit  of  scenery  through  which  she  was  to  flash  had 
been  made  ready  the  day  before.  Three  long  perforated 
rain  pipes  were  erected  on  scaffolds  and  connected  with  the 
standpipes,  and  they  were  reinforced  by  men  who  would 
play  a  fire  hose  or  two  upon  the  hapless  actress.  The  gale 
was  to  be  provided  by  an  airplane  engine  and  propeller 
mounted  on  a  truck. 

Mem,  suffering  the  chill  of  the  night  especially  because 
of  fatigue  and  excitement,  inspected  the  settings  she  was  so 
briefly  to  adorn. 

"Why  do  they  build  that  fence  around  the  wind  machine? " 
she  asked  Kendrick. 

''To  keep  people  from  walking  into  the  propeller  and 
getting  chopped  to  mincemeat,"  said  Kendrick.  "My 
assistant  was  engaged  on  three  pictures  where  airplane 
propellers  were  used,  and  a  man  was  killed  in  each  one 


304  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

of  them.  In  one  of  them  an  airship  caught  fire  and  fell 
during  a  night  picture.  He  was  the  first  man  to  reach  the 
aviator.  He  picked  up  the  poor  fellow's  hot  hand  and  his 
arm  came  off.  It  was  charred  like —  Excuse  me!" 

Mem  gasped  and  retreated  from  the  rest  of  it,  and  she 
kept  as  far  as  possible  from  the  giant  fan.  The  propeller 
made  a  deafening  uproar  when  it  was  set  in  motion,  and  it 
churned  the  air  into  a  small  vertical  cyclone. 

Caught  in  the  first  gust  of  it,  Mem  was  driven  like  an 
autumn  leaf  with  skirts  whipping  away  from  her. 

In  her  first  scene  she  was  to  dash  from  a  house  and  down 
its  steps.  First,  the  men  with  the  fire  hose  soaked  the  shell 
of  the  house,  the  porch,  and  the  steps,  and  the  ground  about 
them  till  they  were  all  flooded.  Then  the  rain  machine  was 
tested  and  sent  its  three  showers  from  overhead. 

The  wind  machine  was  set  in  motion  and  the  air  was 
filled  with  sheets  of  driven  rain.  The  lightning  machine 
added  the  thunder  of  its  leaping  sparks  to  the  turmoil. 

Kendrick,  in  thigh  boots  and  a  trench  coat  he  had  worn  in 
France,  went  to  the  porch  to  test  the  storm.  In  his  hand 
he  carried  an  electric  button  with  a  cable  to  the  lightning 
machine.  This  rang  a  bell  for  the  man  in  charge  of  it. 
The  noisy  wind  machine  was  controlled  by  wigwag  signals 
with  his  hand. 

The  director  was  a  god  in  little.  He  could  bid  the  rain 
rain,  the  wind  roar,  and  the  lightning  blaze.  He  rode  upon 
the  storm  he  created. 

At  first  the  storm  was  too  mild  for  his  taste.  At  his 
command  it  was  aggravated  until  he  could  not  stand  up 
before  it.  Gradually  he  achieved  the  exact  magnitude  of 
violence,  and  the  men  in  control  of  the  forces  of  imitated 
nature  understood  that  thus  far  they  must  go  and  no  farther. 

Under  a  vast  umbrella,  and  behind  shields  of  black  flats 
called  "niggers, "  the  battery  of  camera  men  stood  arranging 
focuses  and  lights.  Two  of  them  used  lenses  that  would 
make  close-ups,  while  the  others  caught  the  long  shots, 
for  there  would  be  no  chance  of  taking  special  close-ups. 

After  an  hour  or  more  of  harrowing  delay  the  army  was 
ready  for  the  battle.  Mem  climbed  up  the  scaffolding  back 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  305 

of  the  palatial  front  door  and  porch.  The  assistant  director 
explained  the  signal  he  was  to  relay  from  the  director, 
and  the  storm  was  ordered  to  begin. 

A  gentle  rain  fell  from  the  pipes.  The  fire  hose,  aimed  up 
in  the  air,  added  its  volume.  The  wind  machine  set  up  its 
mad  clatter.  The  rain  became  a  deluge  of  flying  water  and 
the  lightning  filled  it  with  shattering  fire. 

Then  Mem  was  called  forth.  She  clutched  her  cloak 
about  her  and  thrust  into  the  tempest.  It  was  like  driving 
through  a  slightly  rarefied  cataract.  She  hardly  reached 
the  pillar  at  the  edge  of  the  porch,  clutched  it  for  a  moment, 
caught  a  quick  breath,  and  flung  down  the  steps.  And  that 
was  that .  All  this  preparation  for  one  minute  of  action — save 
for  a  brief  return  to  the  porch  to  pose  for  still  photographs. 

She  was  dripping  and  so  lost  that  she  ran  into  one  of  the 
property  men,  who  checked  her.  Kendrick  came  to  her  and 
gave  her  an  accolade  of  approval.  He  patted  her  sopping 
shoulder  and  said: 

"  Fine !  But  in  the  next  scene  hold  your  cloak  about  you  a 
little  tighter.  The  wind  was  so  stormy  and  your  clothes  so 
wet  that  there  wasn't  much  of  you  left  to  the  imagination. 
In  some  of  the  states  the  censors  may  cut  the  whole  scene 
out.  But  we  won't  retake  it.  " 

When,  two  days  later,  Mem  saw  the  rushes  in  the  projec 
tion  room,  she  could  hardly  believe  that  the  storm  was  a  mat 
ter  of  such  clumsy  artifice.  The  reality  of  it  fairly  terrified 
her.  The  rain-swept  porch  and  the  fury  of  lightnings  about 
the  pillars  gave  no  hint  of  human  devising. 

She  felt  a  surge  of  pity  at  the  bravery  of  the  little  figure 
she  made  plunging  into  the  wrack  on  her  errand  of  rescue. 
The  gale  flung  her  cloak  and  her  skirts  about  her  in  fleeting 
sculptures  of  Grecian  beauty.  But  when  she  paused  at  the 
edge  of  the  steps  and  staggered  under  the  buffets  of  the  wind, 
she  was  aghast  to  see  herself  modeled  in  the  least  detail 
like  the  clay  of  a  statue,  all  the  more  nude  for  the  emphasis 
of  a  few  wrinkles  in  a  framing  drapery.  She  felt  her  first 
sympathy  for  Miss  Bevans's  prudery  and  blushed  in  the  dark 
projection  room.  She  did  not  at  all  approve  the  groan  of  the 
director. 


3o6  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

"Wonderful!  It's  like  an  ivory  statue  on  an  ebony  back 
ground.  To  think  that  the  dirty-minded  censors  will  call 
it  indecent,  the  blackguards!" 

Mem  hoped  that  the  company's  own  censors  would 
excise  it  before  the  outside  world  saw  it ;  but  she  said  noth 
ing.  She  belonged  to  her  art,  body  as  well  as  soul. 

But  this  revelation  was  for  a  later  day.  For  the  present, 
the  director's  caution  to  keep  her  cloak  about  her  was 
alarming  enough. 

She  was  taken  to  a  warm  room  and  WTapped  in  blankets 
while  the  next  scene  was  prepared.  This  was  a  matter  of 
another  hour's  delay.  Rain  pipes  had  already  been  erected, 
but  the  lights  had  to  be  trundled  into  place,  the  cameras  placed 
and  protected,  and  a  hundred  details  made  ready  before 
she  was  called  out  again. 

Holby  and  Kendrick  were  solicitous  for  her  and  asked  if 
she  was  chilled.  She  laughed.  The  adventure  kindled  her 
youthful  arteries. 

It  was  not  so  pleasant  to  stand  still  and  have  the  fire  hose 
lifted  above  her.  She  was  supposed  to  have  run  a  long 
distance  between  the  porch  steps  and  this  scene,  and  she  must 
enter  it  wet. 

She  had  a  bit  of  chill  in  this  shower  bath  and  there  was  a 
hitch  in  starting.  But  at  length  she  got  her  signal  and  went 
forward  again,  head  down,  into  the  wild  storm.  The  pro 
peller  ran  too  fast  and  she  could  not  proceed.  She  clung  to 
a  wall  and  tugged  in  vain.  The  blast  carried  her  cloak  en 
tirely  away  and  she  had  no  protection  from  the  ruthless 
scrutiny  of  the  lightning  or  the  unedited  records  of  the 
cameras. 

The  noise  was  so  appalling  that  the  director  ripped  his 
throat  in  vain.  He  had  to  run  to  the  wind  machine  and  check 
it.  The  picture  had  to  be  taken  over.  Mem's  cloak  was 
recovered,  and  the  mud  washed  from  it.  Then  it  was  laid 
clammily  about  her  icy  shoulders  and  she  made  another  try. 

This  time  the  result  was  better,  and  she  returned  to  the 
room  and  her  blankets  for  another  hour.  She  could  not  seem 
to  get  warm.  Her  bones  were  like  pipes  in  which  the  marrow 
froze. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  307 

When  she  went  out  again  Kendrick  asked  her  how  she 
was.  Her  teeth  chattered  together  as  she  said,  "All 
right-t-t-t. "  He  looked  at  her  with  sympathy  and  admira 
tion,  and  he  decided  to  cut  out  one  of  the  most  promising 
scenes,  lest  it  overtax  her  strength. 

During  her  absence  a  telephone  pole  and  a  tree  had  been 
brought  down  by  the  storm  and  photographed  as  they 
fell.  It  was  her  business  now  to  clamber  across  the  pole 
and  push  through  the  branches  of  the  tree,  and  so  fight  her 
way  out  of  the  picture. 

The  rain  pipes  had  been  brought  forward  and  set  up  in  a 
new  position.  The  cameras  were  aligned.  Next  them  stood  a 
truck  containing  a  great  sun  arc.  Next  that  was  the  light 
ning  machine,  abreast  of  it  the  wind  machine. 

In  the  preliminary  tests  it  had  been  hard  to  find  the  right 
angle  for  the  gale  to  blow  from,  and  the  wind  machine  had 
been  shifted  several  times.  The  wind  man  in  his  confusion 
forgot  to  notice  that  the  property  men  had  forgotten,  in 
their  confusion,  to  set  up  the  fence  before  the  propeller. 
It  was  after  midnight  now  and  everybody  was  numb  with 
cold,  drenched  with  the  promiscuous  rain,  and  a  little  irre 
sponsible.  Their  working  day  was  already  fifteen  hours  old 
and  it  would  last  at  least  five  hours  more. 

The  spectators  who  had  gathered  to  watch  the  first  scenes 
had  been  driven  from  the  lot  by  the  cold  their  thick  cloaks 
and  overcoats  could  not  overcome.  Tom  Holby  had  been 
photographed  in  a  climb  up  the  wet  sides  of  a  ravine,  and 
was  half  frozen  in  his  soaked  clothes,  but  he  stayed  to  watch 
Mem  through  this  scene. 

He  was  palsied  in  the  bundled  wraps  about  him  and  his 
heart  ached  as  he  saw  Mem  in  her  little  wet  dress  throw 
off  her  blankets,  put  on  the  dreadful  mantle  of  the  wet 
cape,  and  go  out  into  the  distant  dark  beyond  the  range 
of  the  cameras. 

The  storm  broke  out  anew  at  the  director's  signal. 
The  wind  bellowed  and  slashed  the  branches  of  the  pros 
trate  tree.  The  lightning  snapped  and  flared  and  its  flare 
winnowed  the  rain  in  flaming  wraiths. 

Then  from  the  dark  the  little  sorrowf ul  figure  of  Remember 


3o8  SOULS    FOR   SALE 

Steddon  appeared,  a  ghost  materializing  from  the  night. 
She  struggled  with  the  maniac  hurricane,  stumbled  and  fell 
across  the  telephone  pole,  thrust  aside  the  wires,  lifted  herself 
and  breasted  the  wind  again,  drove  into  the  wreck  of  the 
fallen  tree.  The  branches  whipped  her  wet  flesh  cruelly. 
The  lightning  just  ahead  of  her  blistered  her  vision  like  the 
white-hot  irons  driven  into  the  eyes  of  Shakespeare's  Prince 
Clarence.  The  wind  blew  her  breath  back  into  her  lungs. 
If  she  had  not  gained  a  little  support  from  one  stout  bough 
of  the  tree  she  could  never  have  reached  the  margin  of  the 
picture. 

Kendrick's  heart  was  glad  with  triumph  as  he  saw  her  pass 
out  of  the  camera  range.  He  called,  "Cut ! "  and  the  camera 
men  were  jubilant  as  each  of  them  shouted  "O.K.  for  me!" 

Then  Kendrick  heard  screams  of  terror,  wild  howls  of 
fear.  He  ran  forward  and  saw  the  blinded  little  figure  of 
Mem  still  pressing  on  straight  into  the  blur  of  the  airplane 
propeller. 

His  heart  sickened.  She  would  be  sliced  to  shreds.  She 
could  not  hear  the  yelled  warnings  in  the  noise  of  the 
machine. 


CHAPTER  XLVII 

THE  operator  shut  off  his  engine,  but  the  propellers 
still  swirled  at  a  speed  that  made  them  only  a  whorl  of 
light.  The  witnesses  were  paralyzed  by  the  horror  of  the 
moment. 

Tom  Holby  broke  from  a  nightmare  that  outran  the  im 
mediate  beauty  of  the  little  woman  walking  forward  to  a 
hideous  fate.  He  ran  and  dived  for  her  like  a  football 
tackier,  hooked  his  left  arm  about  her  knees  and  flung 
her  backward,  thrusting  his  right  arm  and  his  head  be 
neath  her,  so  that  when  she  struck,  her  shoulders  were 
upon  his  breast,  her  drenched  hair  fell  across  his  face  like 
seaweed. 

She  opened  her  eyes  in  a  chaos  of  bewilderment.  Just 
above  her  the  flying  propeller  blades  were  glistening  in  the 
light  of  the  sun  arc. 

They  were  still  revolving  when  the  wind  machine  man, 
leaping  from  the  post  where  he  had  stood  expecting  her  fate 
and  his  own  eternal  remorse,  ran  to  lift  her  from  the  ground. 
Others  helped  up  Tom  Holby. 

He  had  knocked  himself  unconscious  when  his  head  struck 
a  rock  in  the  road.  His  cheek  was  ripped  and  gushing 
blood. 

He  came  to  his  senses  at  once  and  forced  a  ghastly  laugh. 

Mem  screamed  with  fear  for  him.  She  had  not  yet  realized 
her  own  escape.  She  was  all  pity  for  Tom  Holby,  and 
anxiety. 

"It's  nothing,"  he  said.  Then  he  staggered  with  dread 
of  what  Mem  would  have  looked  like  now  if  he  had  waited 
an  instant  longer  or  missed  his  aim  at  her  knees. 

He  drew  her  from  the  vortex  of  the  propeller,  which  was 
subsiding  with  the  dying  snarl  of  a  leopard  that  has  missed 
its  pounce. 


3io  SOULS   FOR   SALE 

Now  Mem  understood  what  her  own  adventure  had  been, 
and  her  knees  weakened  with  an  ex  post  facto  alarm. 

Kendrick  came  up  and,  after  a  decent  wait  for  the  incident 
to  have  its  dignity  and  move  on,  he  thanked  and  congratu 
lated  Holby  on  retrieving  the  girl  from  massacre. 

"It  wouldn't  have  meant  only  the  horrible  death  of  this 
beautiful  child,  but  it  would  have  meant  also  the  horrible 
death  of  this  beautiful  picture;  for  hardly  anybody  would 
have  wanted  to  see  it  if  it  were  stained  with  blood. " 

"And  all  my  beautiful  art  would  have  perished  with  me!" 
said  Mem,  with  only  partial  irony.  She  had  reached  the 
estate  of  the  creative  soul  who  longs  for  the  immortality  of 
its  work  more  than  itself,  and  feels  it  a  death  indeed,  a  death 
entire,  to  have  its  record  lost. 

Just  to  have  a  book  in  a  library,  even  if  it  is  never  read; 
just  to  have  a  painting  on  some  wall;  a  tune  in  somebody's 
ears,  a  scientific  discovery  recorded  somewhere— that  is 
honey  enough  in  the  ashes  that  fill  the  mouth  of  the  morituri. 

Kendrick's  next  thought  was  one  of  dismay.  Tom  Holby 
had  not  yet  fought  his  big  fight,  and  yet  his  face  was  torn. 
How  was  this  to  be  explained  in  the  preceding  scene  where  he 
was  supposed  to  leave  the  arms  of  his  sweetheart  in  her 
defense  ? 

In  the  topsy-turvydom  of  film  construction  the  scene  in 
which  Mem  and  Tom  Holby  were  set  upon  by  a  pack  of 
ruffians  had  not  yet  been  taken,  though  Mem  had  already 
almost  completed  the  scenes  in  which  she  ran  to  call  distant 
strangers  to  Tom's  rescue. 

After  a  long  while  of  puzzling  Kendrick  decided  to  make  an 
effort  to  photograph  Holby  so  that  his  damaged  jowl  should 
be  hidden  by  Mem's  face  or  by  shadows.  It  would  be  hard 
to  manage  and  the  men  who  had  promised  to  beat  Holby 
up  to  the  best  of  their  ability  would  hesitate  to  pummel  a 
man  already  so  hurt. 

But  to  put  the  fight  off  till  the  cheek  was  healed  would 
cost  the  company  a  thousand  dollars  at  least. 

When  Mem  understood  all  the  trouble  it  had  cost  to 
snatch  her  from  destruction,  she  said: 

"I'm  not  worth  it." 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  311 

Kendrick  was  in  no  mood  for  polite  denials,  but  Tom 
Holby  gave  her  a  look  that  made  the  fishing  worth  while. 

Mem  was  blanketed  like  a  racehorse  and  taken  to  her 
dressing  room  once  more.  She  slipped  her  wet  clothes  off 
and  dried  them  and  herself  by  the  fire  while  she  waited 
for  the  next  foray  into  the  storm. 

After  that  was  to  come  the  attack  by  the  desperadoes 
and  her  flight  for  help.  She  had  seen  many  pictures  in 
which  the  heroine  stood  about  wringing  her  hands  idly 
while  her  lover  fought  for  her  with  some  worthless  brute. 
She  had  always  despised  a  heroine  who  would  not  take  up 
a  chair  or  something  and  bash  in  the  head  of  her  lover's 
opponent  instead  of  playing  the  wall  paper. 

She  protested  now  against  having  to  run  away  from  the 
scene,  but  Kendrick  grew  a  trifle  sarcastic: 

"The  company  doesn't  require  you  to  rewrite  the  scenarios, 
Miss  Steddon;  only  to  act  in  them.  Besides,  there  are  half 
a  dozen  villains  here,  and  I  really  think  you'd  better  run  out 
of  the  scene,  seeing  that  we've  already  spent  half  the  night 
and  all  of  our  nerves  showing  you  going  for  rescuers." 

Mem  was  sufficiently  snubbed,  and  apologized  so  meekly 
that  Kendrick  was  still  furious. 

"And  for  God's  sake  don't  play  the  worm!  The  story 
is  rotten  and  your  criticism  is  perfectly  just,  but  we  poor 
directors  and  actors  have  to  do  our  best  with  the  putrid  stuff 
the  office  hands  us.'* 

Men  stood  about  and  watched  the  fight.  It  was  a 
magnificent  or  a  loathsome  spectacle,  according  to  the 
critic.  When  Vergil  describes  an  old-fashioned  battle  with 
wooden  boxing  gloves  macerating  the  opposing  features,  it 
is  accepted  as  of  epic  nobility.  The  movies  give  the  real 
blood  instead  of  nouns  and  knock  out  teeth  with  primeval 
dentistry. 

The  actors  who  assaulted  Holby  were  tender  of  his  raw 
cheek  at  first,  but  both  he  and  Kendrick  demanded  action, 
and  after  Holby  had  smashed  a  few  noses  with  the  effect 
of  knocking  corks  out  of  claret  bottles,  there  was  anger 
enough. 

The  one  caution  Kendrick  shrieked  through  his  mega- 


3i2  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

phone  was  not  to  knock  Holby  senseless  and  not  to  knock 
him  out  of  the  camera's  range. 

The  camera  men  were  tilting  and  panning  their  machines 
to  keep  the  action  within  the  picture,  and  they  were  howl 
ing  contradictory  messages  to  the  fighters. 

There  was  none  of  the  arena  ardor  in  Mem's  soul.  She 
was  none  of  the  girls  who  watched  galdiators  butchered,  or 
thrilled  to  Inquisitional  processions,  or  went  to  modern 
prize  fights. 

She  was  so  sickened  by  the  noise  of  the  blows,  and  the 
spurt  of  blood,  and  that  most  desperate  drama  of  all :  when 
strong  men  batter  each  other  in  rage,  that  she  had  to  re 
treat  into  the  cold  morning  air  out  of  sight  and  hearing  of 
the  buffets  that  seemed  to  land  on  her  own  tender  flesh. 

The  dawn  was  just  pinking  the  sky  when  the  last  of  the 
night  work  was  over.  Everybody  was  dead-beaten.  The 
crews  would  have  to  remain  after  the  actors  had  gone,  and 
the  actors  had  finished  a  twenty-one-hour  day  of  grilling 
emotion  and  physical  toil. 

The  chauffeur  who  took  Mem  home  in  an  automobile 
told  her  that  he  had  already  had  twenty-four  hours  of  driving 
and  would  have  four  or  five  hours  more.  She  expected  him 
to  collide  with  almost  anything,  but  his  eyes  still  attended 
their  office. 

It  was  seven  o'clock  when  Mem  crept  into  her  bed,  an 
hour  later  than  she  had  usually  wakened.  Her  alarm  clock 
stared  at  her  with  rebuke,  but  she  gave  it  a  day  off  and  slept 
till  nightfall. 

The  next  day  the  company  gathered  to  see  the  rushes  of 
the  night  stuff.  Almost  all  of  them  were  perfect,  vivid, 
dramatic  with  the  chiaroscuro  of  lightning  upon  midnight 
storm,  and  incredibly  real. 

A  strange  feeling  came  over  her  and  over  the  others  when 
they  saw  the  various  takes  of  the  scene  in  which  she  clam 
bered  across  the  fallen  telephone  pole,  pushed  through  the 
branches  of  the  toppled  tree,  and  pressed  on  into  the  teeth 
of  the  gale.  For  just  beyond  the  point  of  her  exit  from  the 
picture  the  wind  machine  was  waiting.  She  had  been  hurry 
ing  headlong  to  destruction  and  never  dreamed  of  her  peril. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  313 

Kendrick  sighed,  "That  came  near  being  a  portrait  of 
you  walking  out  of  this  world." 

Tom  Holby  did  not  speak,  but  he  reached  out  and,  seizing 
Mem's  hand,  wrung  it  with  an  eloquence  beyond  words. 
He  seemed  to  be  squeezing  her  heart  with  clinging  hands. 

There  were  five  takes  of  this  bit,  and  Mem  began  only 
now  to  understand  the  hazard  she  had  incurred,  to  com 
prehend  how  close  she  was  to  annihilation,  to  the  end  of 
her  days  upon  this  beautiful  world. 

It  came  upon  her  like  a  confrontation  of  death.  What  an 
unbelievable  thing  it  was!  for  all  of  being  the  most  familiar 
thing  in  life,  the  one  experience  that  nobody  could  escape, 
man,  animal,  plant.  As  that  tree  had  fallen  so  she  would 
have  lost  her  roots  in  the  good  earth.  As  the  telephone  wires 
of  the  prostrate  pole  had  gone  dead,  so  the  thrill  would  have 
ebbed  out  of  her  nerves;  everything  beautiful,  gracious, 
voluptuous,  would  have  been  denied  her.  She  would  have 
been  void  even  of  the  precious  privilege  of  pain. 

The  old  Greeks  joked  about  the  simpleton,  the  philoso 
pher,  who  had  wanted  to  know  how  he  looked  when  he  was 
asleep  and  had  held  a  mirror  before  him  and  shut  his  eyes. 
But  she  had  seen  herself  asleep  on  the  screen,  and  now  she 
had  seen  herself  marching  into  her  grave. 

The  vision  was  intolerable  to  her.  It  assailed  her  like  a 
nightmare.  It  drove  her  frantic  to  make  the  most  of  life, 
to  taste  every  one  of  its  sweets,  its  bitters,  its  glories  and 
shames,  each  tang  of  existence.  To  experience  and  to  make 
others  experience!  She  must  be  quick  about  it,  for  who 
could  tell  what  moment  would  be  the  last?  For  the  sake  of 
other  people  she  must  live  at  full  speed  from  now  on,  act 
many  pictures,  briskly,  brilliantly,  hurriedly,  so  that  she 
should  not  waste  a  grain  of  the  sand  speeding  tlirough  the 
hour  glass. 

As  she  watched  the  last  of  the  takes  her  heart  surged  with 
anguish  for  that  strange  girl  she  was  there,  struggling  against 
the  wind,  fighting  her  way  out  of  a  little  inconvenience  into 
destruction. 

It  seemed  to  her  that  she  typified  all  girlkind,  all  woman 
hood,  all  humanhood,  passion  swept,  love  urged,  braving 


3i4  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

obstacles,  defying  every  restraint  and  stumbling  on  into 
the  lightning,  into  the  lurking  horror,  running  blithely, 
blindly  into  the  ambush  that  every  path  prepares. 

She  was  consumed  with  an  impatience  to  begin  a  new 
picture  at  once,  and  to  be  very  busy  with  life  and  love, 
beauty  and  delight. 

And  yet — there  is  always  an  "and  yet."  The  yets  follow 
in  incessant  procession,  treading  one  another's  heels. 

And  yet,  when  Tom  Holby,  after  they  had  left  the  lot, 
asked  her  to  ride  with  him  for  a  bit  of  air,  and  swept  her  to 
the  perfect  opportunity  of  bliss,  her  soul  balked. 

He  was  handsome,  brave,  magnetic,  chivalrous,  devoted. 
He  had  leaped  into  danger  to  seize  her  out  of  it.  He  bore 
in  his  cheek  a  scar  that  would  mar  him  for  life,  perhaps,  as 
his  badge  of  courage. 

His  big  racing  car,  like  a  fleet  stallion,  had  galloped  them 
far  from  the  eyes  of  witnesses  into  a  sunset  of  colossal  tender 
ness,  with  a  sky  flushed  as  delicately  as  a  girl's  cheek,  yet 
as  huge  as  a  universe. 

They  sped  along  "the  rim  of  the  world"  with  desert  on 
one  side  and  the  whole  Pacific  sea  on  the  other.  The  world 
was  below  them  for  their  observation  and  they  were  con 
cealed  by  distance. 

And  yet,  when  Tom  Holby  told  her  he  adored  her  and 
that  she  was  adorable;  when  he  courted  her  with  deference 
and  meekness  and  pleaded  for  a  little  kindness — her  heart 
froze  in  her.  She  could  not  even  accept  a  proffered  beatitude. 

She  looked  at  him  and  thought — and  said: 

"Too  many  people  love  you,  Tommy.  You  belong  to  the 
public,  and  you  couldn't  bring  yourself  down  to  really  loving 
little  me." 

"Oh,  but  I  could!  I  do!"  he  cried.  "Damn  my  public! 
I  don't  care  for  anything  but  you." 

She  was  not  quite  serious  and  not  quite  insincere  when 
she  answered: 

"But  I  haven't  had  my  public  yet,  and  I  love  it.  I  want 
it.  If  I  ever  grow  as  tired  of  it  as  you  have  done  of  yours, 
then  we  might  see  each  other.  But  just  now  the  only  love 
I  can  feel  is  acted  love." 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  315 

"Then  let's  have  a  rehearsal,"  he  suggested,  cynically. 
But  she  shook  her  head  and  laughed.  She  could  not  tell 
why  she  laughed,  but,  having  tasted  mirth,  she  decided  that 
that  was  what  she  had  chiefly  missed  in  life  and  what  she 
needed  most. 

Her  home  had  been  nearly  devoid  of  gayety  except  of  an 
infantile,  ecclesiastical  sort.  Her  father  had  been  one  of 
those  who  could  never  think  of  Christ  as  wearing  any  smile 
but  one  of  pity  or  forgiveness.  A  laughing  Messiah  was 
incredible,  horrible.  And  as  her  father's  chief  aim  in  life 
was  to  fill  life  with  religion,  hilarity  with  its  inevitable  skep 
ticism  had  no  part  at  home. 

Since  she  had  left  her  home  on  the  most  dismal  of  pil 
grimages,  Mem  had  given  herself  chiefly  to  the  earnest,  the 
passionate  emotions. 

And  now  she  felt  like  a  desert  suddenly  dreaming  of  rain. 

"I  want  to  laugh,  Tommy,"  she  cried.  "Amuse  me, 
make  me  laugh!" 

But  Holby  was  no  wit.  He  had  an  abundance  of  whole 
some  fun  in  his  nature,  and  he  roared  when  he  was  tickled, 
but  he  was  not  a  comedian,  a  humorist,  or  an  inventor  of 
risible  material. 

He  shook  his  head  and  could  not  even  think  of  a  funny 
story,  at  least  of  none  that  he  dared  tell  Mem. 

He  was  as  willing  to  escape  from  her  in  her  present  mood 
as  she  from  him,  and  he  said: 

"There's  the  new  Charlie  Chaplin  comedy.  We  might 
get  in." 

"Let's  try,"  said  Mem.  "I've  just  realized  that  what  I'm 
really  dying  for  is  a  good  laugh,  lots  of  good  wild  laughs  at 
I  don't  care  what." 

Holby  swung  his  car  round  and  returned  toward  Los 
Angeles. 

"Tommy,"  said  Mem,  "what  is  comedy?  What  is  it  that 
makes  a  thing  funny?" 

"Search  me!"  said  Holby.    "I  don't  know." 

"Neither  do  I,"  Mem  pondered.  "But  I'm  sick  of  all 
these  crying  scenes  and  emoting  all  over  the  place.  I  want 
to  be  a  comedienne.  Do  you  think  I  could  be  one? " 


3i6  SOULS    FOR   SALE 

"I  don't  think  so,"  said  Holby,  with  scientific  candor. 
"You  never  made  me  laugh.  You  don't  laugh  much." 

"No,  but  I'm  going  to.  I  think  if  I  ever  love  anybody 
really,  it  will  be  a  great  comedian.  Do  you  know  any  come 
dians  who  aren't  married,  Tommy?" 

"Lots  of  'em,"  said  Holby.  "A  sense  of  humor  keeps  a 
man  from  getting  married — or  staying  married  long." 

Mem  laughed  at  that.  She  did  not  know  why.  Perhaps 
because  he  had  said  it  so  dolefully.  Perhaps  because  it  was 
a  sudden  tipping  over  of  something  solemn.  She  had  spent 
her  life  getting  ready  for  the  holiness  of  matrimony.  She 
had  made  a  wreck  of  her  ideal  and  had  dwelt  in  a  hell  of 
shame  and  remorse  for  the  sacrilege. 

And  now  Tommy  had  implied  that  it  wasn't  so  very  sacred, 
after  all.  He  had  slipped  a  banana  peel  under  a  dismal  ideal 
and  it  had  hit  the  ground  with  a  bump.  The  whole  world 
looked  gayer  to  her,  as  if  some  one  had  flashed  on  a  light. 

She  hoped  the  automobile  would  not  be  wrecked  before 
she  had  this  huge  laugh  that  was  waiting  for  her.  And 
somewhere  in  a  clown's  uniform  was  waiting,  she  was  sure, 
the  man  or  the  career  that  would  illuminate  all  her  existence. 
A  good  laugher  would  be  a  good  lover. 

Making  people  cry  and  educating  them  in  the  agonies  of 
sympathy  was  a  silly  sort  of  ambition.  What  fools  people 
were  to  pay  money  to  be  tortured! 

But  to  be  made  to  laugh — that  was  worth  any  price.  To 
make  people  laugh  in  the  little  while  between  the  two  glooms 
before  birth  and  after  death — to  love  and  live  laughing — 
that  was  to  defy  sorrow  and  to  make  a  joke  of  fate. 


CHAPTER  XLVIII 

NOTHING  could  reveal  the  extreme  youth  and  the  swift 
maturity  of  the  moving  pictures  like  the  career  of 
Charles  Chaplin.  For  a  few  years  he  was  a  byword  of  critical 
condemnation  for  his  buffoonery,  a  proof  of  the  low  public 
taste.  Suddenly  he  was  hailed  as  one  of  the  master  artists 
of  time.  It  was  not  he  that  had  improved,  or  the  public. 
It  was  the  critics  who  were  educated  in  spite  of  themselves 
to  the  loftiness  of  buffoonery  and  the  fine  genius  of  Chaplin. 
The  public  had  loved  him  from  the  start. 

He  was  at  this  moment  in  Europe  meeting  such  a  welcome 
as  few  other  visiting  monarchs  ever  got.  Mobs  blocked  the 
streets  where  he  progressed  until  the  police  had  to  rescue 
him.  Their  Eminences  of  literature  and  statecraft  pleaded 
with  him  for  interviews.  Lloyd  George  begged  for  a  comedy 
of  Charlie's  to  help  him,  as  Abraham  Lincoln  leaned  on 
Artemus  Ward. 

And  yet  he  was  just  out  of  his  twenties  and,  only  a  dozen 
years  or  so  before,  he  had  left  England  as  the  humblest  of 
acrobats  and  the  least  known  of  her  emigrants,  as  ignored 
as  he  was  himself  ignorant  of  the  new-born  American-made 
art  that  was  to  lift  him  to  universal  glory. 

His  picture,  "The  Kid,"  had  been  hailed  as  a  work  of  the 
noblest  quality,  rich  in  pathos  as  in  hilarity.  Solemn  edi 
torials  proclaimed  him  the  supreme  dramatic  artist  of  his 
generation. 

He  was  a  household  word  about  the  world,  a  millionaire, 
and  as  familiar  to  the  children  as  Santa  Claus.  He  had 
become  a  Santa  Chaplin  to  the  grown-ups. 

Yet  numberless  raucous  asses  who  were  quite  as  solemn 
as  Charlie,  but  not  so  profitably  or  amusingly  asinine,  were 
still  hee-hawing  the  old  bray  that  the  moving  pictures  were 
not  an  art,  but  only  an  industry.  Of  course  it  all  depended 
on  one's  own  private  definition  of  the  indefinable  word  "art-''" 


3i8  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

and  it  was  quite  overlooked  by  those  who  denied  the  word 
to  the  Movia  that  if  it  were  only  an  industry  it  was  a  glorious 
industry.  Mark  Twain  decided  that  if  Shakespeare's  plays 
were  not  written  by  Shakespeare,  they  were  written  by  some 
one  else  of  the  same  name.  So  if  the  movies  are  not  an 
art,  they  are  something  else  quite  as  artistic. 

To  Remember  Steddon  they  were  her  first  language  for 
expressing  her  turbulent  self.  To  her  they  were  philosophy 
and  criticism  of  life;  painting  and  sculpture  given  motion 
and  infinite  velocity  with  perfect  record.  They  were  many 
wonderful  things  to  Mem  as  to  the  myriads  of  bright  spirits 
that  had  flocked  to  this  new  banner,  golden  calf,  or  brazen 
serpent,  as  you  will.  And  now  Mem,  having  tasted  of  the 
sorrows  of  the  movies,  was  athirst  for  the  light  wine.  Clown 
ing  at  its  best  is  a  supernal  wisdom,  and  Chaplin's  "The 
Idle  Class"  was  full  of  laughter  that  had  an  edge — a  com 
ment  on  humanity,  a  rejoinder,  if  not  an  answer,  to  the 
riddles  of  existence  and  its  conduct. 

He  played  a  dual  role  in  this  picture,  both  a  swell  and  the 
tramp  he  had  made  as  classic  as  Pierrot.  According  to  what 
plot  there  was,  the  aristocratic  loafer  and  tippler  of  the  first 
impersonation  forgot  to  meet  his  wife  at  the  train,  the  train 
on  which  the  tramp  had  stolen  a  ride  to  his  favorite  resort. 

There  was  mockery  not  only  of  pompous  toffery,  but  of 
serious  emotion  as  well.  When  the  besotted  young  swell 
receives  from  his  neglected  wife  a  letter  saying  that  she  will 
never  see  him  again  until  he  stops  drinking,  he  turns  away, 
and  his  shoulders  seem  to  be  agitated  with  sobs  of  remorse. 
But  when  he  turns  round  it  is  seen  to  be  a  cocktail  that  he 
is  shaking. 

The  jester  was  tweaking  the  nose  of  love  and  repentance 
and  bringing  all  the  high  ideals  off  the  shelf  with  a  bang. 
The  audience,  bullied  a  little  too  well  by  trite  nobilities, 
roared  with  emancipation. 

Again  when  he  dresses  in  a  suit  of  armor  for  the  costume 
ball,  he  cannot  resist  one  more  cocktail.  But  just  as  he  lifts 
it  to  drain  the  glass  the  visor  of  his  helmet  snaps  down  and 
will  not  be  opened  for  all  his  frantic  struggles  and  the  painful 
efforts  of  those  who  come  to  his  aid.  The  least  intellectual 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  319 

spectator  shouting  at  his  antics  could  not  but  feel  the  satiri 
cal  allegory  of  all  life,  wherein  the  visor  always  falls  and 
locks  when  the  brim  is  at  the  lip. 

But  the  triumph  of  joyous  cynicism  was  the  last  flash. 
The  big  brute  who  has  roughly  handled  and  despised  the 
ragged  tramp  repents  of  his  cruelty  and  runs  to  humble 
himself  in  apology.  The  tramp  listens  to  his  beautiful 
self-abasement  and  everyone  expects  a  gracious  finish,  but 
the  incorrigible  clown  gives  the  penitent  a  kick  in  the  behind, 
and  runs  away. 

Bitter  philosophy  it  was  and  shocking  to  the  best  prin 
ciples,  yet  it  was  a  flash  of  the  pride  that  rewards  conde 
scension  and  patronage  and  mawkish  charity  with  a  kick  in 
the  tail  and  takes  to  flight.  It  pictured  what  everyone  in 
the  audience  had  often  wanted  to  do  in  those  resentful 
moods  which  are  so  very  human  because  they  are  so  far  from 
divine.  For  the  soul,  like  the  body,  needs  its  redemption 
from  too  much  sweetness  as  well  as  from  too  much  bitterness. 
There  is  a  diabetes  from  unassimilated  sugar  that  is  as  fatal 
as  too  much  salt. 

And  that  is  the  noble  service  that  farce  and  clownery 
render  to  the  world.  They  guarantee  the  freedom  of  the 
soul,  freedom  not  only  from  glooms  and  despairs,  but  from 
the  tyrannies  of  bigotry  as  well,  from  the  outrages  of  religion, 
of  groveling  idolatries,  all  sorts  of  good  impulses  and  high 
principles  that  ought  to  be  respected  but  not  revered,  ought 
to  be  used  in  moderation  but  not  with  slavish  awe. 

Going  to  a  farce  of  such  a  sort  was,  for  Remember  Steddon, 
going  to  a  school  of  the  highest  educational  value;  it  was  a 
lessoning  in  life  that  she  sorely  needed. 

She  had  been  taking  life  and  love  and  art  and  ambition 
and  sin  morosely. 

Tom  Holby  found  her  already  changed  when  they  set  out 
for  her  home.  She  had  been  restlessly  unapproachable  before 
the  comedy,  like  a  mustang  that  will  not  submit  to  the 
bridle,  will  not  run  far,  but  will  not  be  taken;  that  stands 
and  waits  with  a  kindly  air,  but,  just  as  the  hand  reaches 
out,  whirls  and  bolts. 

Now  that   she   had   seen  the   picture   she   was   serene. 


320  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

She  was  genial,  amiable.  She  snuggled  close  to  Holby  in  the 
car,  and  yet  when  he  spoke  tenderly  she  made  fun  of  him, 
giggled,  reminded  him  of  bits  of  the  picture  that  had  amused 
her.  This  enraged  him. 

"I'm  going  in  for  comedy,"  she  said.  " It's  the  only  thing 
worth  while.  All  this  tears  and  passion  business  makes  me 
sick.  I'd  love  to  have  it  so  that  when  anybody  hears  my 
name  he  smiles.  Wouldn't  it  be  glorious  to  have  a  washer 
woman  look  up  from  her  tub  and  say :  '  Remimber  Steddon  ? 
Och,  yis,  I  seen  her  in  a  pitcher  once  and  I  laughed  till  I  cried '  ? 
Wouldn't  it  be  glorious  to  have  the  tired  business  man  say 
to  his  tired  society  wife :  'I've  got  the  blues,  and  so  have  you. 
There's  one  of  Steddon's  pictures  in  town.  For  God's  sake 
let's  go  see  it  and  have  a  good  laugh!'  Wouldn't  that  be  a 
wonderful  thing  to  stand  for?" 

Holby  made  a  grunting  sound  that  implied,  "I  suppose 
so,  if  you  think  so."  He  added,  after  a  silence:  ''Funny 
thing,  though;  more  people  get  relief  from  a  good  cry  than 
from  a  good  laugh.  If  you  have  tears  to  shed,  and  you  go 
laugh  your  head  off  at  some  damfoolishness,  you'll  find  the 
tears  are  still  there  when  you  get  home.  But  if  you  see 
Camille  or  Juliet  or  some  pathetic  thing,  if  you  watch  some 
imaginary  person's  misery  and  cry  over  it,  you'll  find  your 
own  tears  are  gone." 

"That  may  be  true,"  said  Mem,  "but  all  the  same  I'd 
like  to  take  a  whack  at  comedy." 

Holby  fought  out  in  his  soul  a  decent  battle  of  self-sac 
rifice  before  he  brought  himself  to  the  height  of  recommend 
ing  a  rival.  "There's  Ned  Ling;  he's  looking  for  a  pretty 
leading  woman.  He's  not  Chaplin,  but  he's  awfully  funny 
in  his  own  way  and  he's  getting  a  big  following.  He  usually 
gets  engaged  to  his  leading  lady — saves  money  that  way, 
they  say.  If  you're  so  hell  bent  on  a  comic  career  get  your 
agent  to  go  after  him." 

"Ned  Ling,"  she  mused.  "Yes,  I've  seen  him.  He's 
funny.  He  might  do.  I  may  make  a  try  at  him  a  little  later. 
Just  now  I  feel  all  tuckered  out.  I  want  to  get  away  from 
the  studios,  out  into  the  high  sierras.  I  believe  I'll  buy  a 
little  car  and  go  all  by  myself." 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  321 

But  when  she  reached  her  home  there  was  something 
waiting  in  ambush  for  her — a  letter  from  her  father.  And 
this  was  not  farce,  nor  to  be  greeted  with  a  kick  and  a  run. 

"Oh,  I  was  wondering  if  you  would  ever  come!"  her 
mother  wailed  as  Mem  came  laughing  in  the  door,  still 
laughing  at  Chaplin's  blithe  rebuff  to  maudlin  penances. 

It  was  odd  to  be  greeted  so  by  the  patient  little  woman 
who  irritated  Mem  oftenest  by  her  meek  patience. 

"I  was  so  worried  for  fear  you  had  had  some  accident. 
Why  couldn't  you  have  telephoned  me?" 

"I  told  you  I  might  be  detained  at  the  studio,  mamma, 
and  not  to  expect  me  till  you  saw  me,"  Mem  answered,  and 
had  not  the  courage  to  tell  the  rest  of  the  truth. 

"Oh,  I  know!  I  oughtn't  to  'a'  worried,  but  I'm  a  nuisance 
to  myself  and  to  you  and  to  everybody." 

There  she  was  again!  Taking  that  maddening  tone  of 
self-reproach.  But  Mem  simply  could  not  rebuke  her  for 
it.  She  embraced  her  and  held  her  tight,  instead. 

"It  was  all  because  of  a  letter  I  had  from  your  father.  If 
you  had  come  home  sooner  I  wouldn't  have  mentioned  it 
to  you,  maybe!  Heaven  knows  you  have  trouble  enough, 
and  now  I'm  sorry  I  spoke.  Just  forget  it." 

Then  ensued  a  long  battle  over  the  letter,  Mem  insisting 
upon  reading  it,  fighting  for  it  as  for  a  cup  of  poison  held 
out  of  her  reach. 

And  it  proved  to  be  a  cup  of  poison  when  finally  she 
got  it  from  her  mother's  reluctant  fingers. 

DEAR  WIFE, — The  Lord  giveth  and  the  Lord  taketh  away.  I 
have  lost  you  and  my  darling  daughter  and  my  head  is  bowed  in 
shame  and  loneliness,  but  I  still  can  say,  "Thy  will  be  done." 

I  think  you  should  know,  however,  how  things  are  here.  Other 
wise  I  should  not  write  you.  But  I  am  afraid  that  the  daughter 
that  was  once  ours  might  tire  of  the  husks  of  sin  and  wish  to  come 
home  repentant. 

Bitterness  filled  my  soul  when  I  learned  that  she  was  leading  a 
life  of  riotous  mockery,  and  when  I  saw  the  picture  of  her  smiling 
in  wanton  attire  at  the  side  of  that  smirking  French  general,  I  had 
it  in  my  heart  to  curse  her.  I  wrote  in  my  haste.  I  repented  my 
hardness  of  heart  and  bowed  my  head  in  humble  shame  when  I 
read  your  angry  reply.  I  had  lost  your  love  and  your  admiration, 


322  SOULS   FOR   SALE 

but  that  was  deserved  punishment  for  the  idolatry  that  had  grown 
up  in  my  heart  to-youwards;  and  for  the  mistakes  I  must  have 
made  in  not  giving  our  erring  daughter  a  better  care. 

But  now  it  has  pleased  the  Lord  to  pour  out  the  vials  of  his  wrath 
on  my  gray  hairs.  The  old  mortgage  on  the  church  fell  due  long 
ago,  but  foreclosure  had  been  postponed  from  time  to  time.  We 
gave  a  benefit  to  pay  it  off,  but  everybody  was  too  poor  to  respond, 
and  it  did  not  pay  expenses. 

The  manager  of  the  motion-picture  house  here  offered  to  share 
the  profits  on  the  showing  of  a  picture  in  which,  as  he  had  the 
impudence  to  tell  me,  my  daughter  played  a  part.  But  while  it 
would  have  drawn  money  for  curiosity  that  would  not  have 
responded  to  a  Christian  appeal,  I  felt  that  it  would  be  a  compound 
ing  with  evil,  and  I  put  Satan  behind  me  and  ordered  the  fellow  out 
of  the  house. 

Then  I  made  a  desperate  appeal  to  our  banker,  Mr.  Seipp,  and 
he  promised  to  do  what  he  could  for  us.  But  the  other  day  his  bank 
was  closed  after  a  run  upon  it.  He  had  previously  mortgaged  his 
house  and  sold  his  automobile — the  one  that  killed  the  poor  boy, 
Elwood  Farnaby,  whom  you  will  remember  as  one  of  our  choir. 
The  banker  was  our  only  wealthy  member  and  with  him  failed  our 
last  hope.  The  crops  have  been  poor  and  the  hard  times  have 
affected  the  local  merchants  so  that  pew  rents  have  not  been  paid 
and  the  usual  donations  have  been  withheld. 

There  were  no  conversions  at  the  last  communion.  Even  the 
baptisms  and  the  weddings  that  brought  me  an  occasional  little 
fee  have  been  wanting. 

The  campaign  we  made  to  close  the  motion-picture  houses  on 
Sunday  was  lost  at  the  last  election.  We  are  fallen  on  evil  days. 

What  small  religious  enthusiasm  is  left  in  the  town  has  been 
drawn  away  to  other  churches  where  there  are  younger  ministers 
with  more  fashionable  creeds  and  fresher  oratory.  I  have  not  been 
spared  overhearing  carelessly  cruel  remarks  that  I  was  too  old  to 
hold  the  pulpit  any  longer  and  should  give  way  to  a  fresher  mind; 
but  I  have  not  known  where  else  to  go,  as  I  have  had  no  calls  from 
outside.  And  I  could  not — God  forgive  my  vanity — I  could  not 
believe  that  I  was  yet  too  old  to  toil  in  the  vineyard  of  the  Lord. 
I  have  endured  every  other  loss  but  that,  and  now  the  vineyard  is 
closed. 

The  church  is  to  be  closed.  We  had  no  fire  in  the  stove  last  Sun 
day  and  almost  no  worshipers  were  present.  The  sexton  was  ill 
and  his  graceless  son  refused  to  leave  his  bed. 

What  I  shall  do  next  or  how  take  care  of  the  little  children  that 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  323 

still  cling  to  our  home,  the  Lord  has  not  yet  told  me  in  answer  to 
my  prayers.  I  still  have  faith  that  in  his  good  time  he  will  provide 
a  way  or  call  his  servant  home,  and  I  hope  you  will  not  take  this 
letter  as  a  plea  for  pity.  It  is  only  to  explain  to  you  that  if  you 
should  plan  to  return  to  the  fold  you  will  find  the  fold  a  ruin.  I 
could  not  even  send  you  the  money  for  your  railroad  fare. 

There  was  a  piece  in  the  paper  saying  that  the  moving-picture 
studios  were  also  closing  for  lack  of  funds,  and  I  wonder  if  my  poor 
daughter  has  been  turned  out  of  the  City  of  Pleasure  in  which  she 
elected  to  spend  her  life.  The  rain  falleth  alike  on  the  just  and  the 
unjust. 

My  cup  is  full  and  running  over,  but  my  chief  dread  is  that 
unhappiness  and  want  may  be  your  portion  as  well  as  mine,  and 
that  I  shall  fail  you  utterly  after  providing  so  scantily  for  you  all 
your  days.  I  can  only  pray  that  my  fears  are  the  result  of  loneliness 
and  age  and  weariness. 

It  has  not  been  easy  to  write  this,  but  it  would  have  been  dis 
honest  not  to  let  you  know.  For  months  I  used  to  think,  every 
time  I  heard  the  train  whistle:  Perhaps  it  brings  my  loved  ones 
home.  For  the  last  few  weeks  I  have  feared  that  it  might,  lest  I 
should  have  to  welcome  you  to  utter  poverty.  Even  the  oil  is 
wanting  to  keep  burning  the  lamp  I  used  to  set  in  the  window  every 
evening. 

And  now  may  the  Lord  shield  you  with  his  ever-present  mercy, 
or  at  least  give  us  the  strength  to  understand  that  in  all  things  he 
knowcth  best. 

Your  loving 

HUSBAND. 

As  she  read  this  letter  and  saw  back  of  the  lines  the  heavy 
brows  of  her  old  father,  saw  the  bald  spot  she  had  stared  at 
from  the  choir  loft,  saw  all  the  sweet  wrong-headedness  of 
the  veteran  saint,  Mem's  heart  hurt  intolerably.  From  her 
eyes  fell  streams  of  those  tears  that  she  had  sold  for  so  much 
apiece.  Her  face  was  blubbered  and  crumpled  and  soppy 
as  in  the  crying  contest  for  points. 

Her  old-fashioned  heartache  and  eye  shower  ended  in  an 
old-fashioned  hysterics  of  shrieking  laughter,  of  farcical 
cynicism  at  the  ridiculous  sublimities  of  life.  She  startled 
her  mother  by  crying,  suddenly:  "The  Lord  is  another 
Charlie  Chaplin,  mamma!  He's  just  planted  another  kick 
where  it  will  do  the  most  harm." 


CHAPTER  XLIX 

MEM  had  been  debating  what  make  of  car  to  buy.  Cars 
were  cheaper  in  price  now,  and  wonderful  bargains 
were  to  be  had  in  slightly  used  cars  purchased  by  hardly 
used  stars  who  could  not  complete  the  payments  or  keep 
the  gasoline  tanks  filled. 

She  had  cried  herself  into  money — not  much,  but  a  good 
deal  considering  the  hard  times,  the  general  unemployment, 
and  her  inexperience. 

She  had  spent  little  of  it.  She  had  no  time  to  shop  or  even 
to  go  down  into  the  streets  and  stare  in  at  the  windows. 

She  had  hardly  found  the  time  to  read  the  advertisements 
and  study  the  fashion  plates  in  the  Sunday  supplements. 

What  car  to  buy  and  what  new  house  to  rent  had  been 
amusing  conundrums  for  idle  moments  of  musing.  And 
now  those  conundrums  were  solved.  Her  mother  sobbed: 

"What  on  earth  can  I  write  the  poor  darling?" 

Mem  replied:  "The  answer  is  easy.  I'm  going  to  send 
him  all  the  money  I've  got." 

Her  mother  cried  out  against  robbing  one  of  her  loves 
to  pay  another.  It  seemed  a  cruel  shame  to  take  the  first 
bit  of  cake  from  her  daughter  and  sell  it  to  buy  bread  for  her 
husband. 

"You'll  need  it  yourself.  You  may  not  have  another  job 
soon.  You  need  new  clothes  and  a  rest." 

"Rest  and  the  clothes  can  wait." 

Her  mother  kept  a  miserable  silence  for  a  long  while  before 
she  could  say:  "Your  father  will  never  accept  money  that 
you  have  earned  from  the  pictures.  You  know  him.  He'd 
rather  die.  He'd  rather  the  whole  world  would  die." 

This  gave  Mem  only  a  brief  pause.    She  answered  simply : 

"Doctor  Bretherick  got  me  into  this  business  by  making 


SOULS   FOR   SALE  325 

up  the  pack  of  lies  that  brought  me  out  here.  Now  he  can 
make  up  a  few  more  and  save  poor  daddy  from  desperation." 

She  sat  down  at  once  and  wrote  the  doctor  a  letter,  telling 
him  what  he  must  know  already  of  her  father's  helplessness. 
She  inclosed  a  money  order  for  two  hundred  and  fifty 
dollars.  She  wrote  a  check  at  first,  but  she  was  afraid  to 
have  it  put  through  the  bank  at  Calverly  lest  her  father  hear 
of  it.  She  instructed  the  doctor  to  make  up  another  of  his 
scenarios  about  a  repentant  member  of  the  congregation 
wishing  to  restore  some  stolen  funds — or  anything  that  his 
imagination  could  invent. 

Then  she  set  the  wheels  in  motion  to  secure  an  immediate 
engagement  with  the  next  to  the  greatest  comedian  on  the 
screen,  Ned  Ling,  a  man  whose  private  life  was  as  solemn 
as  his  public  life  was  frantic  and  foolish;  whose  personal 
dignity  was  as  sacred  as  his  professional  dignity  was  degraded ; 
a  man  of  intellectuality;  a  reader  of  important  books;  a 
debater  of  art  theories — but  above  all  a  man  afraid  of 
nothing  so  much  as  he  was  afraid  of  love. 

The  Bermond  Company  was  declaring  another  holiday, 
letting  out  such  of  its  people  as  were  not  under  contract, 
farming  out  such  others  as  it  could  find  places  for  in  the 
shriveled  market. 

The  public  was  not  flocking  to  the  pictures  or  to  anything 
else.  The  exhibitors  were  losing  money  or  closing  down. 

It  was  a  period  of  dead  calm  and  torpid  seas.  Wise  men 
were  trimming  sails  to  the  least  breeze  and  jettisoning  peril 
ous  cargo.  The  too  courageous  ones  were  sinking,  vanishing, 
blowing  up,  dying  of  famine. 

When  Mem  spoke  to  Bermond  of  her  desire  to  play  a 
comedy  with  Ned  Ling,  Bermond  leaped  at  the  idea.  It 
would  take  her  off  his  salary  list  for  weeks  and  it  would  help 
her  fame.  He  was  not  altogether  selfish.  He  arranged  a 
dinner  under  the  pretext  of  a  private  preview  of  Tom  Hol- 
by's  new  picture.  It  was  not  yet  in  its  final  shape,  but  the 
producers  were  glad  to  lend  it  to  Bermond. 

Bermond  warned  Mem  to  wear  her  best  clothes. 

There  was  a  certain  shame  in  her  heart  at  baiting  such  a 
trap,  but  she  felt  now  that  she  had  a  higher  purpose  than  her 


326  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

personal  ambition.  She  was  working  for  her  father  and  his 
church  as  well;  and  religious  motive  has  always  been  a 
wondrous  sedative  to  a  conscience. 

Bermond  saved  her  the  price  of  a  gown  by  lending  her  a 
flashing  Parisian  miracle  from  his  own  big  wardrobe.  It 
was  astounding  to  him  as  it  was  to  Mem  to  find  what  a 
change  clothes  make  in  a  soul.  The  simple  things  she  had 
worn  hitherto  had  once  given  her  a  simple  modesty.  In  her 
first  scenes  she  had  been  as  bad  as  Miss  Bevan,  forever 
pulling  her  skirts  down.  Her  muscles  remembered  when  her 
mind  forgot.  Kendrick  had  yelled  to  her  once,  "In  God's 
name,  Miss  Steddon,  forget  your  knees  and  don't  advertise 
them  by  always  covering  them." 

When  she  saw  herself  before  her  mirror  now  in  the  Paris 
gown  she  recoiled  in  red  horror.  A  tide  of  blood  swept  under 
her  entire  skin.  Her  bosom  was  bared  in  a  great  moony 
sweep,  there  were  no  straps  at  all  across  the  shoulders,  and 
her  back  was  revealed  to  the  waist.  She  had  never  known 
how  beautiful  it  was  until  she  stood  before  her  mirror  and 
looked  slantwise  across  her  shoulder  at  the  creamy  charm 
of  the  gently  rippling  plane. 

She  rose  to  the  challenge  of  opportunity  and  clothed 
herself  in  audacity.  The  consciousness  of  her  beauty  gave 
a  lilt  of  bravado  to  her  carriage.  She  was  happy  in  her 
self,  and  silenced  her  old  modesties  with  a  pious  thought 
that  the  Lord  never  gave  her  such  flesh  for  concealment. 
Her  mother  was  pale  with  terror  of  the  white  swan  this 
pretty  duckling  had  grown  to,  but  she  let  her  sail  away. 

The  unsuspecting  Ned  Ling  came  to  the  dinner  and  never 
dreamed  that  Mem  was  there  to  play  the  Lorelei.  She 
shuddered  at  her  own  coquetry,  but  it  was  art  for  art's  sake 
and  in  Heaven's  name  besides. 

She  met  the  comedian  with  a  mixed  attitude  of  homage 
and  of  self-confidence.  She  made  him  proud  and  she  made 
him  happy.  Best  of  all,  she  put  him  at  his  best.  He  said 
witty  things,  and  her  laughter  was  a  final  allurement. 

After  the  dinner  they  sank  into  big  chairs  in  the  Ber- 
monds'  living  room  to  watch  the  new  picture.  From  a  table 
behind  them  a  little  domestic  projection  machine  sent  a  cone 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  327 

of  light  across  their  heads  to  a  small  curtain.  And  there  a 
Lilliputian  twin  of  Mem  wept  and  fought  and  won  through 
a  tiny  drama. 

From  the  dark,  the  happy  gloom  Ned  Ling  kept  crying 
out  his  enthusiasms  for  Mem's  skill.  He  was  frank  enough 
in  criticism  of  the  picture  as  a  structure.  He  groaned  at 
the  comic  relief  and  he  shouted  in  ridicule  of  the  hackneyed 
situations.  Bermond  echoed  his  praise  and  his  censure. 
The  picture  was  not  a  Bermond  creation,  but  Mem  was. 

In  an  interlude  during  a  change  of  reels  Ned  Ling  said, 
with  all  the  earnestness  of  an  earnest  clown :  "I  love  your 
tears,  Miss  Steddon !  they  make  me  weep.  See  how  wet  my 
eyes  are!" 

He  leaned  close  and  made  her  look  into  his  melancholy 
orbs.  Their  melancholy  was  their  fortune,  for  in  his  pictures 
he  never  smiled  except  when  he  was  in  a  plight  of  comic 
despair. 

"I  love  to  weep,"  he  went  on,  shamelessly.  "Last  Christ 
mas —  How  do  you  suppose  I  spent  my  last  Christmas? 
I  stayed  at  home  alone  and  felt  sorry  for  myself.  I  did! 
Honestly!  I  just  wallowed  in  self-pity.  I  sat  for  an  hour 
before  a  mirror  and  watched  the  tears  pour  down  my  cheeks. 
And  when  they  fell  into  my  sobbing  mouth  I  drank  them, 
and  loved  them  because  they  were  so  bitter.  It  was  the 
happiest  Christmas  I  ever  spent.  Next  Christmas  let's  you 
and  me  sit  together  before  a  mirror  and  have  a  glorious  cry 
and  weeping  duet.  I  can't  imagine  anyone  else  who  would 
make  me  weep  as  lusciously  as  you.  Will  you  come?" 

"I'll  be  there,"  said  Mem,  half  with  pity  and  half  with 
mockery. 

Thereupon,  as  the  lights  went  out  again,  he  laid  his  hand 
on  hers  where  it  rested  on  the  arm  of  her  chair.  When  she 
moved  it  he  clutched  it  eagerly  and  whispered,  "Oh,  please!" 
and  clung  to  it  like  a  lonely  child. 

He  laughed  aloud  at  the  wonderful  battle  Tom  Holby 
put  up,  but  he  cheered  Mem's  every  scene  as  she  dashed 
through  the  storm. 

"How  brave!  How  beautiful  you  are!"  he  murmured, 
leaning  close.  She  whispered  to  him  the  tale  of  how  near 


328  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

she  was  to  death  in  the  scene  when  she  thrust  her  way  through 
the  tree. 

And  now  he  clung  to  her  with  both  hands  as  if  he  would 
save  her  thus  belatedly  from  danger. 

"I  was  very  near  to  death  in  my  last  picture,"  he  said. 
"I  was  supposed  to  sit  down  innocently  on  a  plumber's 
torch.  I  had  on  asbestos  trousers,  but  somehow  my  coat 
tails  caught  fire  and  I  should  have  burned  to  death  if  Miss 
Clave  hadn't  thrown  a  rug  around  me.  Awfully  nice  girl. 
I  could  have  gone  on  loving  her,  but  she  kept  talking  about 
marriage  and  I  was  afraid  she'd  get  me  to  the  altar  some 
day.  God  knows  I'm  afraid  of  marriage.  Aren't  you? 
It  sickened  me  when  I  heard  the  audience  scream  with 
laughter  at  the  scene.  We  kept  it  in  as  it  was  and  gave  it  a 
funny  title.  It  had  just  the  touch  of  obscenity  that  every 
body  loves.  Too  bad  we  Americans  make  such  a  bane  of 
obscenity!  A  little  wholesome  smut  never  hurt  anybody." 

When  the  picture  was  finished  he  told  Bermond  what  a 
genius  he  had  in  Miss  Steddon  and  said  he  wished  he  had  her 
himself.  Bermond  adroitly  and  coquettishly  forced  the 
card  on  his  hand,  and  before  Ned  Ling  quite  knew  it  it  had 
been  arranged  that  Mem  should  be  lent  to  him  at  a  figure 
far  above  her  Bermond  salary. 

"I  stuck  him  for  the  extra  money,"  Bermond  laughed 
afterward,  "but  I  love  to  make  Ned  Ling  pay.  It  hurts  him 
so.  I'll  split  the  bonus  with  you,  my  dear." 


CHAPTER  L 

TOM  HOLBY  called  on  Mem  the  following  evening.    He 
had  so  earnest  a  face,  so  longing  a  manner,  that  she  had 
not  the  heart  to  tell  him  at  once  of  her  triumph  over  Ned 
Ling  and  her  engagement  to  play  the  leading  role  in  his 
next  farce. 

But  Holby  seemed  to  realize  that  something  had  happened 
to  take  her  a  little  farther  out  of  his  parish.  There  was  a 
fugaciousness  in  her  manner,  an  independence  of  him,  that 
terrified  him. 

He  grew  as  flat-footedly  direct  and  simple  as  one  of  the 
big,  bluff  he-men  he  so  often  played.  He  actually  twirled 
his  hat,  running  his  fingers  round  and  round  the  brim  as 
he  did  when  he  was  a  cowboy  making  love  to  a  gal  from  down 
East.  He  was  as  sheepish  as  Will  Rogers  playing  Romeo, 
but  not  so  shriekingly  funny. 

His  very  boorishness  pleaded  for  him,  and  if  Mem  had 
been  free  of  this  new  hunger  of  hers  for  a  taste  of  comedy  she 
might  have  taken  pity  on  him  lovingly. 

But  she  was  in  a  mood  of  deferment  at  least,  and  her 
smiling,  teasing  manner  baffled  him.  In  his  confusion  he 
noted  a  bundle  of  letters  in  his  pocket,  and  for  lack  of  other 
topic  pulled  them  out. 

"This  is  a  pack  of  letters  that  came  to  the  studio  just  as  I 
was  leaving,"  he  explained.  "I  stuffed  'em  in  my  pocket. 
Haven't  had  a  chance  to  look  them  over.  Mostly  mash 
notes,  I  guess." 

He  took  out  the  lot  and  riffled  them  over  like  a  pack  of 
cards. 

"If  they  think  we  movie  people  are  fools,  what  have  they 
got  to  say  of  the  public  that  deluges  us  with  this  stuff? 
Here's  one.    Let's  see  what  it's  like."    He  read  from  a  welter 
of  passionate  script. 
22 


330  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

"DEAR  MR.  HOLBY, — If  I  could  only  tell  you  how  much  I  admire 
you  you  would  be  the  proudest  man  on  earth.  There's  a  picture  of 
you  on  my  bureau  now,  but  it's  only  a  clipping  from  a  Sunday 
supplement.  I  take  it  out  only  when  the  door  is  locked.  Mamma 
would  skin  me  if  she  knew  I  had  it.  I  turn  it  away  when  I  dress, 
but,  oh,  I  do  just  admire  you  so  much.  If  I  could  only  have  a  real 
photo  of  you  to  kiss  good  night  how  proud  I'd  be.  Won't  you  please 
send  me  one?  With  your  own  really  truly  autograph  on  it?  You 
are  my  favorite  of  all  actors — so  manly  and  virrile  and  handsome. 
Oh,  I  just—" 

Tom  shook  his  head  and  stuffed  it  back  in  its  envelope. 

"Will  she  get  the  photograph?"  said  Mem,  with  the  scorn 
of  one  woman  for  another. 

"Oh  yes.  We  can't  afford  to  antagonize  a  single  fan.  My 
secretary  will  send  her  a  picture  and  autograph  it  for  me." 

"Who  is  your  secretary — a  girl?" 

Holby  slid  a  glance  of  eager  query  under  his  eyelids. 
He  hoped  that  there  was  a  tinge  of  jealousy  in  her  heart. 
That  would  be  vastly  encouraging.  But  her  eyes  revealed 
contempt  only,  for  men  and  the  parasitesses  that  haunt  them. 

"No,  he's  a  man,"  said  Tom,  dolefully — "combination 
of  press  agent,  valet,  dresser,  and  secretary." 

The  next  letter  had  a  Philippine  Islands  postmark.  It 
was  from  a  man  in  Cebu.  It  said: 

"DEAR  FRIEND, — Kindly  please  send  me  a  copy  of  your  sympahty 
portrait.  Hoping  to  received  it  your  benevolent  reply.  Many 
thanks  for  my  best  wishes." 

He  read  a  few  more.  They  represented  a  cosmic  clientele. 
But  he  saw  that  they  were  boring  Mem  and  put  them  back 
into  his  pocket. 

"Brave  man,"  she  said,  "you  open  your  mail  in  the  pres 
ence  of  the  woman  you — you — " 

"I  love  and  expect  to  marry,"  he  said,  gripping  her  hand. 
It  was  a  grip  of  authority.  It  was  Cupid  the  constable, 
so  different  from  the  pathetic  clutch  of  Ned  Ling  the  clown 
child. 

Just  now  it  was  Mem's  humor  to  control  somebody.  She 
did  not  oppose  Holby 's  clutch  or  resent  it.  She  followed  the 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  331 

most  loathsome  and  exasperating  of  all  policies,  nonre- 
sistance. 

''You're  not  going  to  marry  me,  Tommy,"  she  said.  "I 
don't  want  to  be  one  of  Solomon's  wives." 

" Solomon's  wives?" 

"Yes.  You're  wedded  already  to  an  army  of  fans.  Half 
the  women  in  the  United  States  seem  to  claim  you  as  their 
spiritual  bridegroom.  I'd  as  soon  marry  a  telephone  booth 
or  a  census  report.  You  make  Brigharn  Young  look  like  a 
confirmed  bachelor;  he  had  only  forty  wives  or  so.  You 
have  a  million." 

"They  make  me  tired." 

"Maybe,  but  what  wouldn't  they  do  to  me?  I'd  get 
poisoned  candy  or  infernal  machines  in  the  mail.  I'd  never 
dare  marry  you.  It  would  be  committing  suicide." 

She  was  not  altogether  without  seriousness;  she  felt  a 
primeval  jealousy,  a  primeval  sense  of  monopoly.  She 
writhed  at  the  thought  of  possessing  only  a  minute  fraction 
of  a  universal  husband,  a  syndicated  consort  whose  portrait 
on  a  thousand  bureaus  inspired  numberless  strange  women 
with  an  ardor  they  called  artistic  admiration,  as  the  medi 
aeval  girls  and  spinsters  set  up  images  of  saints  and  made 
violent  love  to  them  under  the  name  of  religion,  clothing 
amorous  raptures  in  pious  phrases,  and  burning  with  desires 
that  they  interpreted  as  heavenly  yearnings. 

Mem  turned  green  at  the  thought  of  a  husband  whose  real 
lips  she  must  share  with  actresses  on  the  scene  and  whose 
pictured  lips  would  be  kissed  good  night  all  around  the  world. 

It  was  a  monstrous,  fantastic  jealousy,  but  its  foundation 
was  real.  She  shuddered  at  the  prospect  of  being  embraced 
by  a  husband  whose  virility  thrilled  a  multitude  of  anony 
mous  maenads.  If  all  these  idiots  wrote,  how  many  must 
there  be  who  worshiped  in  silence? 

But  she  did  not  express  this  revulsion  to  Tom  Holby. 
She  did  not  really  feel  enough  desire  for  him  just  now  to  be 
jealous,  except  with  a  prophetic  remoteness.  Just  now  she 
was  curious  about  another  type  of  soul,  about  a  comic  sprite. 

She  felt  sure  that  no  women  wrote  Ned  Ling  love  letters 
or  set  him  up  as  an  icon  on  a  bureau.  Ned  Ling's  pictures 


332  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

were  not  sifting  around  the  globe,  setting  fool  girls  aglow, 
for  Ned  Ling's  published  portraits  were  always  grotesque. 
He  was  photographed  with  a  caricatured  face  of  white  chalk 
and  a  charcoal  grimace,  with  a  nonsensical  hat  and  collar 
becoming  almost  as  familiar  now  as  Charlie  Chaplin's  neat 
slovenliness,  his  mustaches,  and  his  splay-foot  shoes. 

Surely  Ned  Ling  was  free  from  the  amorous  bombardment 
of  anonymous  love  letters.  A  woman  might  stand  a  chance 
of  keeping  his  heart  for  her  very  self,  and  it  would  be  cheerful 
to  have  one's  own  comedian  on  the  hearth. 

Thinking  these  things,  Mem  said:  "I'd  be  jealous  of  your 
public,  Tom.  It  is  a  big  one  and  you've  got  to  be  true  to  it. 
I  suppose  it's  because  I've  got  none  of  my  own.  I've  hardly 
had  a  letter  yet." 

"That's  because  your  first  picture  is  only  being  released 
now.  Just  wait!  You'll  be  snowed  under." 

"And  would  you  like  it  if  I  read  you  a  letter  from  some 
man  in  Oklahoma  who  had  my  picture  on  his  bureau  and 
kissed  me  every  night  good  night?" 

"No." 

"Would  you  be  jealous?" 

"Yes!    I'd  want  to  kill  him." 

"Really?"  There  was  a  pleasant  thrill  in  this— a  thrill 
that  will  be  a  long  time  dying  out  of  the  female  soul,  the 
excitement  of  stirring  up  battle  ardor  in  two  or  more  males. 

Mem  went  on,  teasing,  yet  exploringly: 

"And  would  you  kill  any  man  who  put  me  on  a  shrine  and 
worshiped  me?" 

"No.  I'd  realize  that  that  was  part  of  the  penalty  of 
loving  a  great  artist.  There's  a  penalty  about  loving  a  stupid 
woman  that  nobody  else  cares  for,  too.  I'd  realize  that  you 
have  a  right  to  the  world's  love,  and  I'd  be  proud  of  you, 
however  much  it  hurt.  I  shouldn't  lift  my  finger  to  hamper 
your  glory." 

She  was  just  about  to  kiss  him  lightly  on  the  nearer  ear 
for  the  fervor  of  the  first  part  of  his  speech.  But  the  last 
line  checked  her.  There  can  never  fail  to  be  a  little  something 
disappointing  about  a  love  that  is  willing  to  share  its  prey 
with  anyone  else — even  if  it  is  with  everyone  else. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  333 

Perhaps  to  punish  this  sickly  saintliness  she  told  him  flatly 
now  that  she  was  going  to  be  Ned  Ling's  leading  lady. 

This  hurt  him  as  much  as  she  hoped. 

"It's  a  come-down  for  you,"  he  said.  "It's  a  setback. 
You'd  have  been  the  next  big  star  in  the  emotional  field. 
Now  you'll  be  swallowed  up  in  a  comic  two-reeler.  Ling 
never  gives  anybody  else  any  credit  in  his  pictures.  All 
you'll  do  will  be  to  stand  round  and  feed  him." 

"Feed  him?" 

"Yes,  do  things  and  say  things  that  will  give  him  a  funny 
comeback." 

This  was  a  trifle  dampening.  If  he  had  held  to  that  line 
of  argument  he  might  have  turned  her  aside.  But,  as  always, 
he  had  to  say  too  much. 

"Besides,  as  I  told  you,  Ned  Ling  always  makes  love  to 
his  leading  lady.  He  quarreled  with  the  last  one,  Miss 
Clave,  because  she  wanted  more  publicity.  She  wanted  to 
get  a  laugh  or  two  herself  and  a  line  or  two  in  the  advertise 
ments." 

This  stirred  in  Mem  a  double  emotion — one  of  curiosity, 
one  of  self-confidence.  She  had  had  Ned  Ling  clinging  to 
her  fingers  like  a  baby.  She  could  wrap  him  round  one  of 
them,  no  doubt.  Because  Miss  Clave  failed,  that  did  not 
prove  that  a  wiser  woman  would. 

Holby  did  not  quite  persuade  her  to  refuse  the  oppor 
tunity  with  Ling,  but  he  sent  her  to  it  with  misgivings.  He 
put  a  fly  in  the  ointment. 

There  are  always  flies  in  ointment. 

A  few  days  later  a  wasp  fell  into  her  ointment.  She 
received  one  of  the  first  of  the  numerous  letters  that  were 
to  swarm  about  her  path. 


CHAPTER  LI 

TIME  in  southern  California  flew  on  wings  that  seemed 
never  to  change  their  plumage.  At  home  in  Calverly 
the  birds  put  on  their  springtime  splendor,  lost  it,  and  flew 
away.  The  trees  feathered  out  in  leaves  and  in  a  courtship 
glory  of  blossoms,  then  lost  all.  The  flower  bushes  ran  the 
same  scale  from  shabbiness  to  brief  beauty  and  back  again. 
The  very  ground  was  brown,  was  green,  was  bald,  was  white 
with  snow  that  went  and  came  again. 

But  Los  Angeles  was  always  green.  In  December,  March 
— always  there  were  great  roses  glowing,  often  high  up  in 
some  tree  they  had  climbed. 

Sometimes  Mem  grew  angry  at  the  monotony  of  beauty. 
She  read  of  blizzards  in  the  East  and  North  and  longed  for 
a  frostbite  or  the  nipped  cheeks  of  a  Calverly  winter.  There 
was  music  in  her  memory  of  the  frozen  snow  that  rang  like 
muffled  cymbals  under  her  aching  little  feet  as  she  ran  to 
school  pretending  she  was  a  locomotive  and  her  breath  the 
steam. 

But  this  was  only  the  fretfulness  of  the  unconquerable 
human  discontent.  She  had  hated  winter  when  it  tortured 
her,  and  now  the  California  paradise  tortured  her  because 
it  was  winterless.  Even  in  heaven  the  angels  grew  weary 
of  golden  and  jasper  architecture  and  harp  music  and  tried 
to  change  their  government. 

Discontent  with  the  weather  was  only  one  of  Mem's 
unhappinesses.  Her  ambition  was  ruthless  and  her  critical 
faculty  rebuked  her.  She  prayed  for  opportunities  for  bigger 
roles  and  blushed  at  her  obscurity;  yet  when  she  saw  her 
finished  scenes  she  suffered  direfully  because  she  had  done 
them  so  ill.  When  her  colleagues  applauded  her  she  said 
her  true  thought  when  she  answered:  "It  could  have  been 
done  so  much  better.  If  only  we  could  retake  it!" 


SOULS   FOR   SALE  335 

She  was  living  the  artist's  life,  goaded  to  expression, 
rejoicing  in  utterance  and  afterward  anguished  with  regrets 
that  she  had  not  phrased  herself  a  little  differently. 

As  with  every  other  artist  in  the  world's  history,  her  per 
sonality,  her  preferences,  her  very  face  and  form,  offended 
many  people.  Nobody  ever  pleased  everybody.  She  over 
heard  harsh  criticisms  or  they  were  brought  to  her  one  way 
or  another.  They  hurt  her  cruelly,  and  the  more  cruelly  since 
it  was  her  nature  to  believe  them  justified  and  even  a  little 
less  than  harsh  enough. 

Some  happier  natures  than  hers  could  always  protect 
themselves  by  saying  that  the  critic  had  a  personal  spite, 
or  was  a  failure  venting  the  critic's  own  disappointment,  or 
was  too  shallow  to  appreciate,  or  had  been  bribed. 

But  Mem  never  could  wrap  her  wounded  soul  in  such 
bandages.  She  felt  that  the  truth  was  worse  than  the  worst 
she  heard.  She  could  always  find  some  fault  in  her  achieve 
ments  that  the  critics  had  overlooked. 

She  could  not  retake  her  pictures,  however,  and  when, 
occasionally,  a  scene  had  been  shot  over  again  and  she  could 
correct  some  fault,  she  always  found  another  one,  or  more, 
to  replace  it. 

Obscurity  was  a  further  anguish.  She  suffered  because 
so  few  people  had  seen  her  pictures,  and  the  hard  times  that 
diminished  the  audiences  looked  like  a  personal  injury  to 
her  in  her  artistic  cradle. 

And  then  she  had  a  stab  of  another  sort.  She  learned  the 
curse  of  success.  One  of  her  pictures  was  shown  at  the 
California  Theater  in  Los  Angeles,  and  she  sat  in  a  vast 
throng  and  saw  with  pride  that  people  strange  to  her  were 
leaning  forward  with  interest  and  devouring  her  with  their 
eyes.  She  saw  a  fat  woman  sniffle  and  thought  it  a  beautiful 
tribute.  She  saw  a  bald-headed  man  sneak  a  handkerchief 
out  and,  pretending  to  blow  his  nose,  dash  his  shameful  tears 
away.  And  that  was  beautiful  to  her  with  a  wonderful 
beauty.  She  played  a  minor  role,  but  she  heard  people  speak 
of  her  as  the  mob  went  out  among  the  inbound  mob  crowding 
to  the  next  showing. 

The  papers  the  next  day  in  their  criticisms  gave  her  special 


336  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

mention.  She  loved  Florence  Lawrence,  and  Guy  Price, 
Grace  Lindsey,  Edwin  Schallert,  Monroe  Lathrop — all  of 
those  who  tossed  her  a  word  and  put  her  name  in  print. 
A  marvelous  thing  to  see  one's  name  in  print  and  with  a 
bouquet  tied  to  it. 

She  had  but  a  little  while  to  revel  in  this  perfect  reward, 
for  in  a  few  days  a  letter  came  to  her,  forwarded  from  the 
studio. 

The  writing  on  the  envelope  was  strange  to  her.  When 
she  opened  it  there  was  no  signature.  There  was  a  savagery 
about  the  very  writing.  Her  heart  plunged  with  terror  as 
she  read. 

I  seen  your  pictur  last  nite  and  it  made  me  sick  youre  awful 
innasent  and  sweet  in  the  pictur  and  you  look  like  buter  wouldnt 
melt  in  your  mouth  but  I  know  beter  for  Im  the  guy  held  you  up 
in  Topango  cannon  wen  you  was  there  with  that  other  guy  and  took 
your  wedin  ring  off  you  I  dident  know  who  you  was  then  and  I 
dont  know  who  he  is  yet  but  Im  wise  to  you  and  all  I  got  to  say  is 
Ive  got  my  ey  on  you  and  you  beter  behave  or  els  quit  playin  these 
innasent  parts  you  movie  peeple  make  me  sick  youre  only  a  gang  of 
hippocrits  so  bewair. 

Mem  felt  odious  to  herself,  with  all  the  revolting  nausea 
of  evil  revealed.  There  is  remorse  enough  for  a  struggling 
soul  that  knows  its  own  defeats  and  backslidings,  but  it  is 
nothing  to  the  remorse  that  follows  a  published  fault. 

This  letter  was  more  hideous  than  headlines  in  a  paper. 
It  was  more  dreadful  than  such  a  pilloried  public  shame  as 
Hester  Prynne's.  It  meant  that  somewhere  there  was  a 
man  in  an  invisible  cloak  of  namelessness  and  f  acelessness  who 
despised  her  and  jeered  at  her  sublimities  of  purity.  Her 
highest  ambitions  were  doomed  to  sneering  mockery. 

She  was  thrown  back  into  the  dark  ages  when  girls  were 
told  that  guardian  devils  floated  about  them  as  well  as 
guardian  angels — all  manner  of  leering  enemies,  incubi, 
succubi,  witches,  fairies.  She  could  hear  such  hellish  laughter 
as  Faust's  Gretchen  heard. 

She  longed  to  find  this  man  and  implore  his  mercy.  But 
how  could  she  discover  him?  He  was  a  thief  and  could  only 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  337 

disclose  himself  by  betraying  his  own  crime.  Yet  he  felt 
himself  less  wicked  than  she. 

She  saw  before  her  a  long  life  of  such  attacks.  She  resolved 
to  do  two  things — lead  thenceforth  a  blameless  life  and  play 
thenceforth  only  such  characters  as  made  no  pretense  of 
perfection. 

She  was  the  more  determined  to  seek  a  foothold  in  comedy, 
in  wild  farce.  She  wanted  to  play  a  woman  of  sin,  a  vampire, 
anything  that  would  free  her  of  the  charge  of  wearing  a 
virtuous  mask. 

She  burned  the  letter,  but  she  could  never  forget  it.  She 
could  not  walk  along  a  street  or  ride  in  a  car  without  wonder 
ing  if  the  last  man  who  cast  a  glance  her  way  might  not  be 
the  thief  who  had  robbed  her  of  something  irretrievable. 
When  she  sat  in  a  moving-picture  theater  she  wondered  if  he 
were  not  the  man  at  her  elbow,  and,  since  few  men  failed  to 
look  at  her  with  a  trailing  glance  that  caught  a  little  on  her 
beauty  as  on  a  hook,  she  was  incessantly  thrown  into  panics. 

In  time  she  grew  brazen  and  said  she  didn't  care.  A  little 
later  she  forgot  the  terror  that  walked  by,  but  now  and  then 
it  would  return  upon  her — as  often  when  she  was  alone  as 
when  she  was  in  the  range  of  human  eyes. 


CHAPTER  LII 

'"PHE  first  thing  that  struck  Mem  about  the  business  of 
1  selling  jokes  was  the  melancholic  despondency  of  it. 
In  the  other  studios  there  had  been  a  deadly  earnestness  at 
times,  but  usually  a  cheerful  informality.  But  Ned  Ling 
was  in  a  state  of  nerves  and  dismal  with  anxieties. 

The  first  scene  rehearsed  showed  Mem  being  ardently 
proposed  to  by  a  dapper  young  juvenile  whose  grace  and 
beauty  were  to  be  the  foil  for  Ned  Ling's  triumphant  ugli 
ness.  The  juvenile  was  instructed  to  do  a  simple  bit  of 
business. 

Young  Mr.  McNeal,  realizing  that  the  scene  was  supposed 
to  be  mildly  funny,  tried  to  play  it  in  a  mood  of  gayety — to 
"horse"  it  a  little  with  a  slight  extravagance  of  manner  and 
a  humorous  twinkle  in  his  eye. 

Ned  Ling  checked  him  at  once. 

"Cut  out  the  comedy,  Mr.  McNeal,  if  you  please!  It's 
all  right  to  be  funny  in  an  emotional  picture,  but  comedy  is 
a  serious  business.  A  joke  is  dynamite,  and  if  it's  handled 
carelessly  it  will  blow  up  in  your  hands  and  take  you  with  it. 
I  want  the  audience  to  blow  up,  not  you.  So  you  cany  that 
scene  as  seriously  as  you  can." 

The  criticism  hurt  young  Mr.  McNeal,  but  it  warned 
Mem.  She  went  through  her  own  business  with  a  simple 
matter-of-factness  as  if  it  had  no  humor  in  it.  This  was 
because  she  did  not  know  how  to  make  it  funny.  To  her 
amazement,  Ned  Ling  cried  out: 

"Great!  Perfect!  Play  it  straight!  The  audience  wants 
to  laugh  at  your  expense.  Don't  let  'em  know  you  know 
you're  funny,  or  you're  gone.  But,  Mr.  McNeal,  I  must  ask 
you  not  to  crab  Miss  Steddon's  scene." 

"Crab  the  scene,  sir?    What  did  I  do?" 

"You  moved." 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  339 

" Don't  you  want  me  to  move?" 

"Never!  Not  when  somebody  else  is  getting  off  a  point. 
You  can  kill  half  or  all  the  laugh  by  distracting  attention. 
An  audience  can  only  see  one  thing  at  a  time — get  one  idea 
at  a  time.  You've  got  to  ship  'em  your  jokes  like  a  train  of 
box  cars.  You  can't  jumble  'em,  or  there's  a  wreck. 

"When  Miss  Steddon's  at  work,  you  freeze!  And  Miss 
Steddon  will  do  the  same  when  it's  your  turn.  And  when 
I'm  with  you  I'll  murder  you  if  you  move  an  eyelid  when 
I'm  springing  something.  And  you  can  murder  me  if  I 
breathe  during  anything  of  yours.  And  one  thing  more. 
Watch  out  that  you  don't  spoil  your  own  comedy  by  moving 
the  wrong  part  of  your  anatomy.  I  can  kill  the  best  face 
play  in  the  world  by  moving  my  feet  or  my  hands.  I  can 
kill  the  work  of  my  hands  by  rolling  my  eye.  Remember 
that!  Comedy  is  the  most  solemn  business  there  is." 

Mem  was  amazed,  dismayed  at  the  anguish  of  exactitude 
attending  each  little  bit  of  silly  wit.  She  had  captured  her 
tears  and  her  dramatic  climaxes  with  a  rush.  But  wit  had 
to  be  stolen  upon,  prepared,  and  exploded  just  so. 

Ned  Ling  at  lunch  time  told  her  of  a  year  of  meditation 
spent  on  one  idiotic  incident.  He  had  not  got  it  right  yet. 
It  might  not  be  ready  for  this  picture  or  the  next.  Some 
day  it  would  come  out  just  right,  and  then  it  would  appear 
like  an  improvisation  of  the  moment. 

He  was  especially  delicate  about  the  broad  bits.  He  was  a 
lover  of  coarse  jokes;  he  loathed  the  Puritanism  that  gave 
them  an  immoral  quality.  Yet  they  would  not  have  been 
half  so  funny  or  perhaps  not  funny  at  all  if  it  were  not  for 
the  forbidding  of  them,  just  as  nakedness  would  have  no 
spice,  no  commercial  value,  and  would  suggest  no  evil 
thoughts  if  it  were  ignored  or  made  compulsory,  or  if  the 
wrong-headed  moralists  did  not  surround  it  with  horror  and 
give  it  the  fascination  of  rarity. 

Mem  suffered  acutely  from  Ned  Ling's  discussions  of 
risky  humor.  She  had  never  heard  such  talk. 

She  was  like  a  trained  nurse  getting  her  first  glimpse  of 
life  through  the  eyes  of  a  doctor,  learning  not  to  swoon  at  the 
lifting  of  the  veils. 


340  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

Ned  Ling  had  a  doctor's  impatience  of  prudery,  the  same 
contempt  for  the  vicious  indecency  of  what  he  called  the 
nasty-nice.  He  jolted  Mem  horribly,  but  he  shook  the  furni 
ture  of  her  soul  into  more  solid  places. 

Like  a  nurse,  like  a  woman  doctor,  Mem  was  far  more 
decent  after  this  course  of  training  than  before.  But  it  took 
all  her  nerve  to  keep  from  wincing,  from  protesting,  from 
taking  up  that  obsolescent  woman's  weapon,  "How  dare 
you!" 

She  learned  in  time  to  laugh  whole-heartedly,  like  a  man, 
at  the  coarse  verities.  She  was  not  educated  up  to  Rabe 
lais.  Few  women  have  ever  yet  gone  so  high  in  the  upper 
humanities. 

She  would  never  love  the  great  vulgarities,  but  she  was 
emancipated  from  the  smaller  squeamishness,  the  wide-eyed 
doll  nrnd,  and  the  Kate  Greenaway  innocence. 

That  was  why,  perhaps,  she  could  revel  so  wonderfully 
in  "The  Beggar's  Opera"  when  she  saw  it. 

It  was  the  first  opera  she  ever  did  see,  grand  or  comic. 
Not  even  a  musical  comedy  had  passed  her  eyes  and  ears. 
Her  father  did  not  believe  in  opera,  and  if  he  had  had  his 
way  Mozart,  Verdi,  and  Wagner  would  have  been  as  dumb 
as  Shakespeare — for  he  abhorred  the  playhouse,  too.  The 
catalogue  of  his  abhorrences  was  unending.  He  abhorred 
almost  everything  human  that  he  could  think  of  except  when 
it  was  twisted  into  a  form  of  prayer.  He  liked  opera  when  it 
was  disguised  as  oratorio  and  the  singers  wore  their  own 
clothes  instead  of  evil  costumes.  He  liked  plays  about  Santa 
Claus,  and  he  vaguely  approved  the  old  miracle  plays  the 
Church  had  fostered,  since  he  never  dreamed  how  indecent 
many  of  them  were.  He  was  beginning  to  admit  that  motion 
pictures  of  educational  or  religious  purpose  might  atone  for 
their  sins. 

But  Mem  would  as  soon  have  asked  permission  to  go  to  a 
dance  as  to  a  theater  in  Calverly. 

Los  Angeles  had,  for  a  city  of  its  size,  a  minimum  of 
theatrical  entertainments.  The  long  haul  across  the  deserts 
made  it  prohibitive  of  late  years  for  most  companies  to 
visit  the  Pacific  coast.  She  had  seen  a  few  plays  given  by 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  341 

the  city  stock  companies  and  by  the  Hollywood  Community 
Players.  She  had  even  dragged  her  mother  to  those  devilish 
amusements  and  brought  her  away  without  a  sniff  of  brim 
stone. 

Her  acquaintance  with  the  world  was  almost  exclusively 
of  the  movies,  movish.  Like  the  people  of  all  other  trades, 
when  the  cinemators  had  a  free  evening  they  spent  it  in  more 
of  the  same.  The  picture  houses  were  frequented  by  the 
picture  people — of  whom  there  were  thousands  in  Los  Angeles. 

Her  first  opera  was  curiously  the  last  opera  one  might  be 
expected  to  see  at  all  in  her  day. 

Somebody  in  London  had  been  inspired  to  revive  the 
sensation  of  1728.  It  had  run  for  a  solid  year  in  the  new 
London  and  another  season  in  New  York.  Its  ancient  art 
had  glistened  like  a  Toledo  blade.  It  made  the  epigrams  of 
Oscar  Wilde  and  Bernard  Shaw  look  old-fashioned. 

An  opera  whose  hero  was  a  thief  and  whose  scenes  were 
sordid — the  gayest  of  operas,  it  dumfounded  Mem  as  it  had 
set  old  London  aghast.  There  where  the  rival  Italian  com 
panies  had  made  war  in  an  otherwise  undisputed  field,  it 
suddenly  arose  and  laughed  them  off  the  boards — drove 
Handel  into  bankruptcy,  drove  him  to  such  despair  that  he 
went  to  Ireland  and,  casting  about  for  something  to  do 
beside  the  operas  that  were  a  closed  career  for  him,  tossed 
off  in  three  weeks — "The  Messiah "(!)  and  became  immortal 
as  a  religious  force. 

Thus  much  Mem  learned  before  the  curtain  rose.  After 
it  was  up  she  learned  to  laugh  uproariously  at  the  utmost 
delicacies  of  indecency.  It  made  an  earthquake  in  Mem's 
soul  to  sit  alongside  Ned  Ling  and  listen  to  the  scene  where 
the  heroine  horrifies  her  parents  by  announcing  her  mar 
riage  to  a  handsome  young  man — horrifies  them  not  because 
she  wished  to  marry  a  highwayman,  but  because  she  wished 
to  marry  at  all,  except  possibly  some  old  man  for  financial 
reasons. 

Mem  was  aghast  when  they  ridiculed  their  daughter's 
talk  of  love;  at  length  the  father  protested,  "Do  you  think 
your  mother  and  I  should  have  lived  comfortably  together 
GO  long  if  we'd  been  married?" 


342  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

This  was  as  terrifying  as  a  scarlet  snake,  but  Mem  shook 
with  laughter,  then  collapsed  into  dismay.  If  she  could 
laugh  at  that,  what  decency  had  she  left? 

Her  soul  groveled  in  itself  remorsefully  until  the  next 
epigram  jarred  it  out  of  its  opossumism,  and  she  laughed 
again. 

She  had  so  lost  her  orientation  by  the  finish  of  the  seduc 
tive  villainies,  that  she  did  not  faint  when  Ned  Ling  said: 

"I've  laughed  myself  hungry.  I  haven't  ordinarily  any 
appetite.  Let's  go  to  my  house  and  have  a  bite." 

"To  your  house?" 

"Yes.  It's  all  right.  I'm  quite  alone  there.  Just  a  Jap. 
Very  secluded." 

She  wanted  to  say:  "You  tell  me  not  why  I  should  go, 
but  why  I  should  not.  And  I  won't." 

But  it  seemed  a  silly  little-girlish,  old-maidish,  prunes- 
and-prismish  thing  to  say. 

Wasn't  she  an  independent  woman  now,  a  voter,  a  free 
and  equal  self-supporting  citizen  of  the  United  States?  In 
her  imagination  she  could  hear  the  wild  crew  of  the  "Beg 
gar's  Opera"  laughing  at  her  for  a  shy  little  hypocrite. 
Lacking  the  courage  to  obey  her  instinct  and  her  training, 
she  said,  "All  right,"  and  got  into  Ling's  car. 

When  he  said,  "Home,"  to  the  driver  she  almost  swooned, 
but  not  quite. 

The  Jap  showed  no  surprise  at  the  late  arrival  of  his 
master  with  a  lady.  Evidently  it  was  the  ordinary  thing. 
Mem  longed  for  a  mask  or  a  fire  escape  or  a  gun.  She  glanced 
about  for  weapons  of  defense. 

But  Ned  Ling  said:  "Some  scrambled  eggs  and  bacon — 
some  wine.  Would  you  rather  have  red  or  white? — or  a 
little  champagne?  Let's  have  some  champagne — yes?  Yes, 
we'll  have  some  champagne — native  California — but  good." 

She  felt  as  Jack  of  the  Beanstalk  felt  when  he  found 
himself  among  ogres. 

But  Ling  turned  out  to  be  an  infantile  ogre,  if  ogre  at 
all.  He  was  more  like  an  art-gallery  guide  at  first.  He 
showed  her  his  treasures.  He  knew  something  of  art,  or  so 
she  judged  him  from  his  talk,  for  she  knew  nothing  of  it 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  343 

herself;  but  his  manner  was  impressive.  He  was  especially 
proud  of  a  portrait  just  painted  of  him  by  one  of  the  Cali 
fornia  artists.  Ling  spoke  of  him  as  of  the  "California 
school." 

Ling  had  brought  home  some  jades  from  a  voyage  to  China. 
He  was  addicted  to  jades,  of  a  certain  deep,  dark,  emerald 
hue.  He  hated  the  sickly  pallor  of  the  usual  jade.  Mem 
decided  to  take  up  jade  hunting  as  a  sport  when  she  got  rich. 

At  the  table  Ling  resumed  his  play  with  her  fingers.  She 
felt  only  curiosity.  She  could  feel  neither  alarm  nor  anger. 
She  was  hungry,  but  he  kept  one  of  her  hands  prisoner  and 
preferred  to  talk. 

Afterward  they  went  into  the  beautiful  living  room,  a 
strange  room  for  a  clown;  more  like  what  she  imagined  a 
millionaire's  room  to  be,  judging  from  what  millionaires' 
rooms  she  had  seen  in  the  movies. 

He  put  a  Caruso  record  on  the  victrola,  that  old  wail  from 
"Pagliacci,"  the  heartbreak  of  the  clown  who  is  human  in 
spite  of  the  powder,  and  feels  red  blood  beneath  the  grease 
paint.  Caruso  was  just  recently  dead  and  honored  with  the 
funeral  of  a  church  dignitary,  wild  minstrel  that  he  was, 
singing  his  way  around  the  world  on  rubber  wheels  the  way 
the  filmers  traveled  in  celluloid  spools. 

"A  few  years  ago,"  said  Ling,  "and  a  singer's  voice  died 
with  him.  And  now  Caruso  is  singing  here — everywhere. 
He'll  sing  as  long  as  Homer — poor  old  blind  Homer,  who 
never  saw  a  picture,  never  knew  that  his  own  songs  would 
live  after  him  in  the  invention  of  the  alphabet,  never  dreamed 
that  they  would  be  printed  and  used  as  schoolbooks  thou 
sands  of  years  after  he  quit  poking  about  the  world  singing 
about  the  fighters  of  his  day. 

"A  few  years  ago  and  we  actors  were  condemned  to 
oblivion  as  soon  as  we  left  the  boards.  But  we  can  go  on 
forever  now.  They're  laughing  around  the  world  at  me  this 
minute.  Listen!"  He  kept  an  eerie  quiet  and  she  could 
almost  hear  what  he  perked  his  ears  to  catch.  "That's  a 
gang  of  sweaty  coolies  in  China.  They're  helped  to  forget 
the  opium,  laughing  at  me.  Hear  that!  That's  starving 
people  in  Russia  forgetting  their  hunger  because  the  seat 


344  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

of  my  breeches  caught  on  fire.  Did  you  hear  that  yelp? 
That  was  one  of  the  exiled  kings  guffawing  when  I  got  shot 
in  the  pants  by  an  angry  husband.  The  king  has  forgotten 
his  own  grief." 

This  cosmic  boastfulness  did  not  keep  him  long  in  pride. 
' 'But  I  hate  my  pictures.  I'm  jealous  of  them.  People 
don't  like  me — they  just  like  that  thing  with  the  chalky  mug. 
They  love  him  because  he's  such  a  fool.  I  want  to  be  loved 
because  I  am  Me  and  not  a  fool. 

"Look  at  this  painting  of  me.  The  artist  caught  the  real 
me.  See  all  the  sorrow  in  the  eyes  and  behind  the  mouth. 
See  the  longing  and  the  unhappiness  ?  That  painter  got  under 
my  skin.  He  got  to  me.  I  love  that  because  it's  me." 

Suddenly  he  bent  over  and  kissed  his  own  image  on  the 
mouth.  It  was  the  mad  act  of  a  Yankee  Narcissus — over 
come  not  by  his  own  loveliness,  but  by  his  own  loneliness. 

Mem  was  dazed.  She  had  a  normal  woman's  normal 
interest  in  her  mirror  because  a  mirror  is  the  show  window 
of  the  goods  she  has  for  sale.  She  had  become  of  necessity 
self-conscious,  self -critical.  She  had  admired  extravagantly 
the  reflection  of  herself  in  the  looking-glass  the  night  she 
went  forth  to  meet  this  Ned  Ling  in  her  first  magnificent 
gown.  But  she  had  never  divided  herself  into  such  a  pair  of 
twins,  such  a  Mutual  Consolation  Society ,  Ltd. ,  as  Ned  Ling 
had  organized. 

And,  as  often  happens,  seeing  that  he  was  so  sorry  for 
himself,  she  felt  no  draught  upon  her  own  sympathy.  She 
simply  stared  and  wondered. 

He  made  her  sit  down  on  a  long  couch  and  snuggled  close 
to  her.  She  was  still  rather  curious  than  alarmed.  He  took 
up  her  hand  again  and  studied  it,  talking  in  the  rather  liter 
ary  manner  he  sometimes  assumed:  "Each  separate  finger 
has  its  own  soul,  don't  you  think?  Hands  are  families. 
Your  own  hands — anybody's  hands — are  a  group  of  people. 
Hands  are  different,  and  fingers — they're  wicked — capable 
of  such  terrible  things — holding  daggers,  gifts — caressing— 
throttling — playing  music — exploring — loving — hating. 
Queer  things,  fingers.  Your  right  hand  and  your  left  hand 
aren't  the  least  alike  and  your  face  is  still  a  third  person." 


SOULS   FOR   SALE  345 

Before  Mem  quite  realized  how  solemnly  ludicrous  a 
couple  of  comedians  could  be — if  anybody  had  been  looking 
— except  God — and  perhaps  that  Jap  valet — Ned  Ling's 
head  was  on  her  breast  and  his  eyes  were  turned  up  into  hers 
— like  a  baby's.  He  was  in  a  newborn  prattling  humor. 
That  was  a  secret  of  his  success.  He  was  a  baby  with  all  a 
baby's  privileges  of  impropriety,  selfishness,  hatefulness, 
adorableness. 

He  could  revert  to  infancy  and  take  his  audience  with 
him,  make  old  men  and  women  laugh  at  the  simple  things 
that  had  tickled  their  childish  hearts.  And  withal  there 
was  an  amazing  sophistication.  He  was  a  baby  that  calcu 
lated  and  measured,  triumphed  and  yet  wept  and  wanted 
always  the  next  toy.  He  was  thinking  of  Mem  as  his  next 
toy  and  she  was  thinking  of  him  as  her  next  child. 

His  warm  head  and  his  brown  eyes  like  maple  sugar  just 
as  it  is  liquescent  to  syrup,  and  with  the  same  gold  flakes 
glinting — they  were  quaintly  babyish  to  her  in  spite  of  his 
old  talk. 

"I  want  to  love  and  be  loved,  but  not  to  love  too  much. 
I'm  afraid  of  love.  It  has  hurt  me  too  bitterly.  Some  of 
them  haven't  been  true  to  me,  and  that  hurt  me  horribly. 
And  I  haven't  been  true  to  some  of  them — and  that  hurt 
me  still  worse.  I  don't  know  which  is  ghastlier — to  see  a 
woman  laugh  at  you  or  cry  at  you.  Marriage  is  no  solution. 
I  don't  see  how  it  can  help  being  the  end  of  love.  Love  ought 
to  be  free — like  art  and  speech.  Of  course  art  isn't  free. 
There's  the  censorship.  Well,  marriage  is  like  censorship. 
Everything  you  do  and  say  and  feel  must  be  submitted  to 
the  censor.  They  call  this  a  free  country  and  have  censor 
ships  and  marriage!" 

She  smiled.  He  was  more  like  a  prattling  baby  the  more 
cynical  he  grew.  His  heavy  head  made  her  breast  ache  and 
yearn  for  a  baby.  But  he  wanted  only  the  froth  of  life  with 
out  the  body  and  the  dregs. 

" Could  you  love  me  just  enough  and  not  too  much?" 
he  pleaded. 

If  he  had  said,  "Marry  me  to-morrow!"  he  might  have 
had  her  then.  But  she  had  not  his  opinion  of  marriage. 


346  SOULS    FOR   SALE 

She  had  played  the  game  without  the  name — endured  the 
ecstasy  and  the  penalty  without  the  ceremony.  She  had 
escaped  public  shame  by  a  miracle  of  lucky  lies  and  accidents. 
The  hunger  remained  for  the  rewards  of  marriage,  the  hon 
esty  of  a  home,  the  granite  foundations  of  respectable  loyalty. 

So  when  he  pleaded  with  her  for  love  that  cheated  and 
played  for  fun  and  not  for  all,  for  a  kiss,  for  caresses,  she 
shook  her  head — mystically  as  he  thought,  but  very  sanely 
and  calmly,  in  truth. 

She  was  far  away — mothering  a  shadowy  child,  swaying 
in  a  rocking-chair  throne. 

Ned  Ling's  prayers  gained  fervor  from  her  aloofness.  He 
called  upon  a  goddess  who  would  not  hear.  She  held  his 
hands  and  slapped  them  with  a  matronly  condescension 
that  drove  him  frantic. 

He  could  not  get  past  the  cloudy  masonry  he  had  built 
round  her  by  deriding  marriage.  It  was  a  good  subject  for 
jokes,  but  contempt  for  it  was  more  ridiculous  than  the  thing 
ridiculed. 

Finally  she  yawned  in  the  face  of  his  passion  and  said, 
"I'll  be  going  home  now,  please." 

He  was  so  thwarted  and  rejected  that  he  sent  her  home 
alone.  She  was  grateful  for  that. 


CHAPTER  LIII 

AGAIN  when  she  got  home  her  mother  was  waiting  for 
her.  Her  father  was  waiting  for  her  again. 

Her  mother  had  fallen  asleep  with  her  father's  letter  in 
her  hand.  As  Mem  slipped  in  guiltily  and  stared  at  her, 
she  leaped  up  in  alarm  and  cried  out  in  protest,  with  a  sleepy 
reversion  to  ancient  authority:  "Mem,  have  you  proven 
utterly  shameless?  Have  you  gone  wrong  at  last?" 

Mem  smiled  and  shook  her  head.  Something  in  her  calm 
convinced  her  mother  more  than  any  angry  disclaimer  could 
have  done.  She  breathed  deeply  with  relief  from  the  night 
mare  that  rides  mothers'  souls  night  and  day.  She  smiled 
as  she  held  out  another  letter  from  the  old  child  they  were 
both  mothering. 

MY  BELOVED  WIFE, — You  will  find  it  hard  to  believe  what  I  am 
about  to  write,  for  you  were  never  quite  convinced  that  prayers  are 
answered.  Well,  mine  have  been  and  I  am  more  than  ever  confirmed 
in  my  faith. 

A  miracle  has  been  vouchsafed  unto  me,  even  me! 

This  morning  Doctor  Bretherick  called  to  see  me  and  stated 
that  he  had  been  intrusted  with  a  mysterious  message.  A  former 
parishioner  of  mine,  a  man  whose  name  he  was  forbidden  to  disclose, 
had  embezzled  some  money  years  ago  and  had  never  been  dis 
covered.  The  still  small  voice  of  his  conscience,  however,  was 
never  silenced,  and  at  last  it  drove  him  to  restitution.  But  he 
found  that  the  people  whom  he  had  wronged  were  dead  and  there 
were  no  heirs  to  receive  the  funds. 

In  his  distress  at  being  unable  to  relieve  his  soul  of  its  remorse, 
he  bethought  himself  of  his  old  church,  and  wrote  to  Doctor  Breth 
erick,  who  had  been  his  physician  in  the  old  days,  asking  him  to 
convey  the  money  to  me  for  such  use  as  I  found  best.  Doctor 
Bretherick  placed  two  hundred  and  fifty  dollars  in  my  hands  and 
assured  me  that  more  would  come  from  time  to  time  until  the 
principal  and  the  interest  had  been  paid. 


348  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

I  fell  on  my  knees  in  thankfulness,  and  even  Doctor  Bretherick, 
hopeless  old  skeptic  that  he  is,  was  not  free  from  a  moisture  about 
the  eyes.  When  I  reproached  him  with  his  little  faith  he  could  not 
deny  that  there  was  something  in  this  beyond  his  ability  to  explain 
by  any  of  his  materialistic  nonsense. 

He  would  not  even  give  a  hint  as  to  the  anonymous  donor,  but 
I  have  my  suspicions  as  to  who  the  man  is.  He  left  town  some 
years  ago  and  has  grown  rich  in  New  York.  My  prayers  follow 
him. 

I  cannot  write  more !  I  am  too  busy  renewing  the  life  of  this  dear 
old  church.  The  mortgagees  have  accepted  a  part  payment  and 
agreed  to  prolong  the  loan.  The  members  have  taken  a  new  lease 
on  faith  and  some  of  the  wanderers  have  been  drawn  back  to  the 
fold.  A  member  on  an  outlying  farm  has  turned  in  three  fat  pigs 
to  sell,  and  two  merchants  have  indorsed  a  note  which  the  bank 
has  discounted.  The  other  preachers  may  be  younger,  but  they 
cannot  point  to  such  a  miracle. 

As  Elijah  was  fed  by  the  ravens,  so  some  unknown  benevolence 
has  rescued  this  old  man  of  yours  from  the  deeps  of  helplessness. 

If  only  you  could  come  home  now,  and  if  our  beloved  child  could 
see  the  light,  all  would  be  well.  Tell  her  of  my  good  fortune  and 
say  that  my  cup  of  joy  would  overflow  indeed  if  only  she  might 
give  up  her  error  before  the  night  falleth.  I  am  trying  not  to  ask 
too  much  of  Heaven,  but  I  am  counting  on  seeing  you. 

Your  loving 

HUSBAND. 

Never  had  Mem  felt  more  ancient  or  more  motherly  than 
when  she  saw  this  aged  child  converted  again  to  Santa 
Claus.  His  blind  confidence  in  his  wrongheadedness  filled 
her  heart  with  tender  amusement. 

She  was  thoroughly  happy  and  fully  rewarded  for  the 
sacrifice  of  her  savings,  but  she  was  too  freshly  come  from 
the  home  of  the  farceur  to  escape  a  torment  of  cynicism. 
She  put  ice  in  her  mother's  heart  when  she  said:  "  I  saw  '  The 
Beggar's  Opera'  to-night,  mamma — the  wickedest  thing  I 
ever  did  see,  too.  But  if  it  hadn't  been  for  that,  Handel 
wouldn't  have  written  '  The  Messiah. ' ' 

This  was  academic  enough  to  pass  her  mother  without 
protest.  But  Mem  went  on  with  diabolical  logic,  "If  Eve 
hadn't  eaten  the  apple,  then  Christ  would  never  have  come 
to  earth." 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  349 

"Hush,  in  Heaven's  name!" 

"Hush  is  always  good  advice,  mamma,  but  I  can't  help 
realizing  that  if  I  hadn't — well,  sinned  is  the  word — with 
poor  Elwood  Farnaby  I'd  never  have  run  away  from  home. 
If  I'd  never  run  away  from  home  I'd  never  have  come  out 
here;  I'd  never  have  earned  a  cent;  I'd  never  have  had  a 
cent  to  send  to  poor  daddy — and  his  church  would  have 
gone  to  smash.  So  you  see — " 

"No,  I  don't!"  said  Mrs.  Steddon,  "and  you'd  better 
not." 

"All  right,  I  won't,"  said  Mem,  kissing  the  frightened 
face;  "but  it's  a  funny  world,  isn't  it,  mamma?" 

"Not  at  all,"  said  mamma. 


CHAPTER  LIV 

MEM  dreaded  to  go  to  the  studio  the  next  day  for  fear 
of  the  comedian  who  had  overnight  become  a  rejected 
lover. 

But  Ling  separated  shop  from  life  completely  and  gave 
no  sign  of  the  self-tormentor,  the  love  puzzle  he  became  of 
evenings.  He  was  once  more  the  chemist  fretting  over  the 
minutias  of  laugh-getting,  pondering  the  hair's-breadth  lift 
of  an  eyebrow,  perfecting  the  mixtures  of  action  to  the  least 
scruple. 

The  child's  lonely  heart  was  forgotten  and  he  was  the 
keen  professor  in  his  laboratory.  Mem  wondered  if  other 
scientists  became  just  such  babblers  when  they  went  back 
to  their  homes  and  their  boarding  houses. 

She  also  became  the  woman  professor  storing  up  informa 
tion.  She  began  to  wonder  if  the  same  accuracy  would  not 
be  of  value  in  the  manufacture  and  sale  of  tears  and  sorrows. 
She  began  to  revert  to  her  old  ambitions  and  to  feel  that 
the  business  of  laughter  making  was  not  her  line. 

The  pathos  and  the  amiable  farce  of  her  father's  delusion 
warmed  her  heart  toward  the  homely  sentiments  of  the 
everyday  people.  She  wanted  to  play  small-town  heroines 
and  enact  village  tragedies  with  a  sunlight  of  laughter  woven 
through,  them.  After  all,  most  people  were  either  in  or 
from  small  towns.  The  richest  bought  themselves  farms 
and  dwelt  in  villages,  and  she  had  read  that  Marie  Antionette 
had  her  Petit  Trianon  where  she  dressed  as  a  peasant  and 
fed  chickens. 

She  began  to  long  for  a  role  made  to  order  for  herself. 
She  had  been  putting  on  other  people's  ready-made  ideas, 
wearing  characteristics  that  came  to  her  complete,  adjusting 
her  own  body  and  spirit  to  a  preconceived  creation. 

Now,  like  all  growing  actor  souls,  she  grew  impatient  for 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  351 

a  mantle  cut  to  her  own  shoulders  of  a  tint  suited  to  her 
own  complexion. 

One  evening  when  a  Thursday-night  dance  at  the  Holly 
wood  Hotel  drew  a  throng  of  movie  makers  of  all  the  branches 
of  the  industry,  she  fell  in  with  a  Miss  Driscoll,  who  wrote 
continuities  and  was  one  of  the  leading  spirits  of  the  Screen 
Writers'  Guild.  She  was  also  one  of  the  chief  officers  of  the 
new  Writers'  Club,  which  had  just  bought  a  house  and 
opened  a  clubhouse  where  men  and  women  mingled  in  dis 
regard  of  ancient  prejudice. 

Miss  Driscoll  thrilled  Mem  by  saying  that  she  ought  to 
have  a  picture  written  especially  for  her.  She  said  she  had 
been  watching  Mem's  work,  had  been  talking  about  her  a 
lot  to  Tom  Holby.  She  paid  Mem  the  marvelous  compli 
ment  of  a  personality,  an  individuality.  She  wanted  to 
write  something  "around  her." 

Four  men  who  begged  Mem  for  a  dance  were  vaguely 
snubbed.  Miss  Driscoll's  voice  was  more  fascinating  with 
that  theme  of  her  Self  than  even  the  saxophone  with  its 
voice  like  the  call  of  a  goat-legged,  shaggy  Pan  turning 
dance  floors  into  leafy  forests  and  putting  a  nymph  or  a 
faun  inside  each  ballgown  or  dinner  coat. 

Love  of  a  very  fleshly  and  woodland  appeal  was  of  an 
inferior  magic  to  the  spell  of  a  voice  that  said,  "Let  me  write 
and  publish  you  as  your  own  self  to  the  world." 

Mem  was  beginning  to  respond  to  the  same  self-splitting 
introspection  that  she  had  pitied  or  scorned  in  Ned  Ling 
and  in  other  actors  who  were  always  worrying  over  an 
infidelity  to  their  Selves. 

Tom  Holby  came  up  and  commanded  her  to  dance.  When 
she  begged  off  he  lifted  her  from  her  chair  and  eloped  with 
her  like  Jupiter  carrying  off  Europa.  But  her  thoughts 
remained  with  Miss  Driscoll  and  this  wonderful  new  world 
where  she  was  to  enact  her  Self. 

Tom  Holby  soon  realized  that  he  had  only  an  empty  shell 
in  his  arms  and  he  put  her  back  into  her  chair. 

But  Miss  Driscoll  had  been  carried  away  by  another 
dancer,  and  Mem  found  herself  alongside  a  man  whom  she 
recognized  as  an  author  of  continuities,  also  one  of  the  chief 


352  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

spirits  of  the  Screen  Writers'  Guild  and  one  of  the  chief 
officers  of  the  Writers'  Club. 

And  he  introduced  himself  as  Mr.  Hobbes,  saying  that  he 
had  been  watching  her  work  for  some  time  and  that  she  had 
a  distinct  personality,  a  peculiar  photographic  genius.  "I'd 
love  to  write  something  around  you,"  he  said. 

Mem  chuckled  with  the  infantile  pride  of  discovering  that 
she  had  toes,  ten  of  them!  She  also  had  a  Me,  and  an  altar 
was  rising  to  it. 

When  Miss  Driscoll  returned,  panting  and  mopping  her 
brow,  she  said  to  Mr.  Hobbes:  "You  lay  offn  my  star!  I 
seen  her  first." 

"Nonsense ! "  said  Mr.  Hobbes,  "I've  been  dreaming  about 
her  for  weeks." 

Mem  felt  divinely  foolish  as  the  wishbone  of  such  a  rivalry. 
But  when  Tom  Holby  drifted  back,  as  always,  and  Ned  Ling 
came  up  to  glorify  her  with  attentions,  both  of  them  felt 
that  she  was  cut  off  from  them  by  some  transparent  but 
impassable  cloud. 


CHAPTER  LV 

MEM  found  it  a  marvelous  thing  to  have  geniuses  begging 
for  the  privilege  of  writing  the  words  to  the  music 
of  her  beauty,  librettos  for  her  limber  personality. 

She  had  met  so  few  authors,  and  those  few  so  briefly, 
that  she  still  thought  of  them  as  miracle  workers  of  a  peculiar 
mystery,  creators  who  spun  out  little  universes  at  their 
own  sweet  will. 

The  hack  continuity  writers  she  had  encountered  had  not 
confirmed  this  quaint  theory,  and  she  soon  learned  that 
most  of  them,  somewhat  like  the  dwellers  on  a  certain 
famous  island,  earned  a  precarious  existence  by  stealing 
one  another's  plots. 

The  novelists  she  had  read  but  not  seen  were  still  cloudy 
beings  who  dropped  tablets  from  their  private  Sinais.  She 
felt  that  if  she  were  even  lucky  enough  to  touch  the  hem  of 
the  garment  of  one  of  them  she  would  ask  him : 

"How  on  earth  do  you  ever  think  of  your  plots?" 

In  good  time  she  would  learn  to  know  some  of  the  most 
famous  of  the  men  and  women  who  plowed  with  a  pen  and 
were  as  much  hitched  to  it  as  it  to  them.  And  she  would 
find  them  also  poor,  harrowed,  plain  people,  wondering 
what  life  is  all  about  and  why  their  sawdust  dolls  would  not 
behave  like  humanity.  Each  of  them  had  his  or  her  favorite 
critics  who  made  life  a  burden  and  every  new  work  a  target. 

Still,  for  a  time,  it  was  drinking  the  milk  of  paradise  and 
feeding  on  honeydew  to  find  herself  inspiring  strangers  with 
a  desire  to  build  stories  as  airplanes  and  chariots  for  her  to 
ride  and  drive  to  glory.  It  was  warming  to  have  strange 
persons  writing  in  from  nowhere  and  everywhere  imploring 
her  to  touch  their  manuscripts  with  her  life-giving  radiance, 
make  them  walk  and  lift  their  authors  out  of  their  hells  of 
oblivion. 


354  SOULS    FOR   SALE 

When  the  compliment  became  a  commonplace  it  became 
a  bore,  a  nuisance,  a  pest,  an  outrage.  An  amazing  number 
of  strangers  wrote  her  that  their  life  stories  would  make  her 
rich  and  famous,  and  were  far  more  dramatic  than  the  works 
of  Griffith,  Jeanie  McPherson,  John  Emerson,  Anita  Loos, 
Marion  Fairfax,  June  Mathis,  Thompson  Buchanan,  J.  G. 
Hawks,  Charles  Kenyon,  Monte  Katterjohn,  and  the  other 
photoplay  wrights. 

She  answered  such  letters  as  she  could  by  hand  and 
labored  to  avoid  repetitions  of  phrase.  Then  she  set  her 
mother  to  work  to  copying  out  forms,  and  finally  made  her 
mother  sign  them  with  her  best  imitation  of  Mem's  name. 

"And  now  I'm  a  forger!"  gasped  Mrs.  Steddoii.  "What 
next?" 

By  and  by  both  of  them  were  so  overworked  with  the 
increasing  task  of  answering  letters  from  every  kind  of  per 
son,  ranging  from  little  girls  of  eight  to  elderly  Japanese 
gentlemen,  and  offering  everything  from  a  prayer  for  a 
photograph  to  an  opportunity  to  pay  off  a  mortgage,  that 
Mem  began  to  hate  and  revile  her  annoyers. 

Here  and  there  was  a  letter  of  gracious  charm,  a  cry  from 
some  sore-beset  soul,  a  word  of  rewarding  gratitude  from 
one  who  felt  a  debt  to  her  art,  a  glimpse  of  some  wretch 
with  a  cancer  of  ambition  gnawing  a  hapless  soul.  Young 
girls,  unluckily  married  and  dwelling  on  farms  far  distant 
from  Los  Angeles,  described  the  color  of  their  hair  and  eyes, 
and  the  compliments  they  had  had  from  their  neighbors, 
and  begged  to  be  brought  to  Los  Angeles  that  they  might 
trade  their  messes  of  pottage  for  their  birthrights  of  wealth 
and  renown.  They  opened  their  windows  to  Los  Angeles  as 
to  the  city  of  deliverance — which  it  had  been  to  a  multitude. 

Sometimes  the  letter  unconsciously  conveyed  more  land 
scape  and  character  than  a  laborious  author  could  achieve, 
and  carried  with  it  an  air  of  helpless  doom  that  was  heart 
breaking.  There  were  many  of  the  following  sort: 

DEAR  Miss  STEDDON 

May  I  interduce  my  self  to  you? 

Im  a  little  Arizona  Girl,  an  I  want  to  know  how  to  be  come  a 
Movie  Star. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  355 

Will  you  pleace  take  A  few  minutes  of  your  time  an  tell  me  all 
about  it. 

Does  it  take  lots  of  money  to  be  come  a  Movie  Star. 

Every  since  I  was  15  years  old  Ive  craved  to  be  a  star. 

My  people  Objected  very  much. 

When  I  Was  17  I  began  Work  £  when  19  I  Married. 

I  An  husband  seperated,  so  Now  Im  on  the  plains  with  my 
fauther  an  Mather.  I  have  a  2  months  Old  baby  boy. 

I'll  be  21  in  Feb.  Im  call  a  disapointed  brunette.  I  weight  117 
— 5  ft.  4  in.  I  think  111  send  you  a  little  Picture  of  my  self  so  you 
can  see  for  your  self  how  I  look. 

I  am  a  prity  good  dancir.    As  I  was  prity  buisy  my  self  I  must  go. 

Please  take  a  few  Minutes  An  drope  me  a  few  lines  about  this. 

Yours  truly, 

MRS.  JACOB  LAYTON. 

Youth  might  break  through  the  hasps  of  fate,  though  Mem 
could  only  answer  that  thousands  of  experienced  actresses 
were  out  of  work  and  there  was  little  chance.  There  was  less 
hope  still  for  the  dowdy  middle-agers  who  wrote  from  mid- 
Western  villages  inclosing  photographs  that  would  have 
ended  their  chances  if  they  had  had  any;  but  they  wanted 
to  know  how  to  get  famous  quick. 

Actors  without  experience,  authors  who  could  not  spell, 
people  of  every  imaginable  and  unimaginable  disability, 
sent  their  pleas  to  this  new  goddess,  and  she  was  as  helpless 
to  grant  them  as  the  gods  above  have  always  been  to  respond 
to  the  petitions  that  rain  toward  them  from  the  volcanic 
fires  of  the  molten  hearts  of  this  world. 

Mem  could  not  answer  even  with  advice.  And  she  felt 
that  she  was  making  enemies  everywhere  faster  than  friends. 

Fame,  too,  has  its  income  tax  to  pay,  and  the  rate  increases 
by  the  same  doubling  and  trebling  with  which  the  govern 
ment  punishes  success  in  the  form  of  money. 

Writhing  at  the  humiliations  of  obscurity,  Mem  was  com 
ing  swiftly  up  into  the  humiliations  of  conspicuity. 

The  letter  from  the  hold-up  man  was  followed  by  another 
less  terrifying,  but  no  less  belittling  to  her  pride.  She  had 
just  been  glowing  with  the  first  thrill  of  the  first  requests 
for  her  photograph  and  for  her  autograph,  paid  for  in  advance 
by  flattery,  if  not  postage,  when  her  eager  eyes  met  this — 


356  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

from  Yuma — written  by  a  landlady  who  carried  her  hash- 
making  propensities  into  her  English: 

Miss  REMEMBER  STEDDON 
nee  MRS.  JOHN  WOODVILLE 

Bermond  Studios,  Los  Angeles,  Calif. 

DEAR  MADAME: 

Seeing  as  I  seen  your  pitcure  at  the  theater  here  last  nihgt  and 
recongized  you  as  the  lady  who  left  a  trunk  here  saying  she  would 
send  for  it  as  soon  as  she  and  her  husband  got  theirselves  located 
and  you  never  done  so  and  going  to  the  mooving  pitcure  the  other 
nihgt  as  I  say  I  saw  you  or  so  I  believ  on  the  serene  as  Miss  Steddon 
and  very  pertty  you  was  to  I  must  admit  and  so  how  about  your 
trunk  is  what  I  am  asking  and  their  is  storage  charges  onto  it  and 
Mrs.  Drissett  who  is  still  with  me  and  seen  the  pitcure  with  me  says 
to  ask  you  do  you  remember  her  asking  you  about  being  a  Woodville 
and  your  saying  you  was  ashamed  of  your  husbands  folks  or  rather 
that  he  didant  have  no  folks  at  all  and  she  notices  as  you  used 
another  name  and  hopeing  to  hear  from  you  soon  and  do  what  is 
rihgt  is  my  motto  and  I  espect  other  folks  to  do  the  sam 

Yours  respecfuly 

MRS.   CLEM  SLOAT 

Mem's  own  behavior  had  been  more  inelegant  than  Mrs. 
Sloat's  syntax.  Her  whole  life,  indeed,  had  been  ungram- 
matical  to  the  last  degree. 

She  had  slunk  away  from  Yuma  with  all  the  ignobility  of 
a  coyote,  and  this  sudden  searchlight  restored  her  to  her 
craven  memories. 

She  had  crept  from  dark  to  dark  then,  but  now  she  was 
both  the  priestess  and  the  prisoner  of  the  light,  the  victim 
of  her  fame,  the  captive  rather  than  the  captain  of  the 
soul  she  had  for  sale,  the  tremendously  advertised  soul  she 
had  for  sale. 

Helen  of  Troy  found  the  face  that  launched  a  thousand 
ships  a  most  embarrassing  possession,  for  the  thousand 
ships  went  after  her  and  besieged  her.  And  now  Mem's 
past  was  coming  up  in  all  directions  like  troops  of  siege. 

She  wondered  now  who  would  be  the  next  to  confront 
her  with  some  half-forgotten  distortion  of  the  truth.  She 


SOULS    FOR   SALE  357 

wondered  if  every  step  she  had  taken  and  was  to  take  would 
leave  a  petrified  footprint  like  the  fossilized  traces  of  a 
primeval  insect  for  all  eternity. 

She  could  not  decide  what  answer  to  make  to  either  letter, 
and  so  made  none  at  all.  The  writer  naturally  supposed  her 
guilty  of  indifference  and  contempt  for  her  feelings,  but  her 
silence  was  actually  due  to  contempt  for  herself  and  her 
inability  to  devise  a  decent  excuse. 

Now  and  then  she  sought  escape  from  brooding  in  spurts 
of  gayety.  She  went  about  with  Tom  Holby  and  Ned  Ling, 
and  with  other  suitors  among  the  various  pleasances  of  Los 
Angeles.  She  danced  at  the  Alexandria  to  the  bewitching 
fiddlery  of  Max  Fischer;  and  at  the  Cocoanut  Grove  in  the 
Ambassador  made  part  of  the  mucilaginous  eddy  of  human 
ity  that  tried  to  follow  Art  Hickman's  uncanny  music. 

She  missed  no  Wednesday  night  at  the  Sunset  Inn,  and  on 
one  occasion  almost  won  a  dancing  prize  with  a  wonderful 
lounge  lizard.  Thursday  nights  found  her  at  the  Hollywood 
Hotel.  She  was  dancing  fiercely,  but  never  quite  away  from 
her  past.  At  the  Turkish  Village  she  drank  the  thick,  sweet 
glue  called  coffee  and  chatted  with  Lucille.  She  learned  to 
know  the  Mexican  dishes,  the  carne  con  chile  and  the  tamales 
at  the  Spanish  Kitchen.  She  went  through  the  inevitable 
phase  of  looking  up  odd  places  to  eat  and  enjoying  poor  food 
because  it  was  quaint. 

She  joined  the  horseback  rides  that  set  out  from  the 
Beverly  Hills  Hotel  and  threaded  the  canons  till  they  came 
upon  breakfast  spread  in  a  glen.  She  motored  to  Santa 
Barbara  and  heard  the  nightingale  at  El  Mirasol,  or  sat  on 
the  terrace  of  the  moonlit  Samarkand  and  dreamed  herself 
in  Persia.  She  motored  to  San  Diego  and  beyond,  tasting 
the  rival  delights  of  the  old  Spanish  Mission  at  San  Juan 
Capistrano,  and  the  gambling  across  the  Mexican  border  in 
Tia  Juana. 

She  took  a  course  of  Philharmonic  concerts,  heard  the 
world-famous  singers  and  instrumentalists,  and  regretted 
the  tongueless  career  she  had  adopted. 

But  she  learned  to  chatter  of  art  and  music  in  little  groups 
of  devotees,  composers,  painters,  sculptors,  verse  makers, 


358  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

story  writers  that  make  up  the  countless  clubs  of  a  city 
already  as  big  and  as  busy  as  half  a  dozen  Athenses. 

She  was  broadening  and  deepening  her  mind  and  her  heart, 
and  aerating,  volatilizing  her  spirit. 

She  toiled  all  the  while  at  her  own  technic.  When  she 
finished  the  short  comedy  with  Ned  Ling  she  was  drawn 
back  to  the  Bermond  Studio  for  the  principal  role  in  a  big 
picture.  She  was  not  yet  to  be  starred,  but  she  was  to  be 
"featured"  with  a  young  man,  Clive  Cleland,  who  was 
spoken  of  as  Tom  Holby's  successor. 

Young  Cleland  fell  prey  to  her  growing  fascinations,  but 
he  was  so  much  her  business  rival  and  their  professional 
love  scenes  were  such  duels  for  points,  that  she  could  not 
think  of  him  as  an  amateur  in  love.  Besides,  an  unsuspected 
loyalty  to  Tom  Holby  was  wakened  in  her  heart  by  the 
pretence  that  this  raw  youth  was  Tom's  " successor." 

Tom  Holby  was  out  in  the  Mojave  Desert  on  location, 
and  his  absence  pleaded  for  him  like  a  still,  small  voice  that 
interfered  with  the  murmurs  of  nearer  lovers. 

She  was  full  of  impatiences  of  every  sort. 

She  had  fallen  out  of  love  with  herself. 

Mannerisms  that  directors  or  critics  pointed  out,  or  that 
she  discovered  for  herself,  vexed  her  to  distraction.  It  was 
a  strange  thing  to  recognize  in  herself  a  fault  that  she  detested 
in  others  and  was  yet  unable  to  eradicate.  Striving  to  avoid 
these  recurrent  tricks,  she  grew  self  -  conscious,  and  people 
said  that  she  was  getting  a  swelled  head  when  she  was  most 
in  a  panic.  What  they  took  for  conceit  was  the  bluff  of  a 
rabbit  at  bay. 

And  all  the  while  the  longing  for  a  home,  a  single  love, 
a  normal  average  life,  alternated  with  onsets  of  cynical 
defiance  for  the  conventions. 

While  nature  was  clamoring  in  her  blood  for  mating  and 
motherhood,  her  new  freedom  drove  her  to  anarchic  pro 
tests  against  submission  to  the  functions  of  the  beasts. 

Mem  was  in  a  chaos  morally.  She  was  at  her  spring,  all 
her  senses  aleap  with  youth  and  desire  and  a  wilding  joy 
in  breaking  through  old  rules.  The  moralities  were  to  her 
the  ice  that  the  April  brooks  sweep  away  and  the  torrents 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  359 

melt;  the  grim  white  ice  of  winter  that  freezes  life  and  puts 
love  and  art  and  beauty  asleep. 

She  was  so  horrified  by  the  indecencies  of  the  Puritans 
and  the  censors  and  the  critics  of  her  career,  that  revelry 
became  a  duty.  The  Maypole  was  a  liberty  pole. 

But  the  dramatic  world  had  its  Puritans  as  the  religious 
world  has  its  gypsies. 

In  the  picture  she  was  making  at  this  time  the  role  of  her 
rival  for  the  love  of  the  lover  was  played  by  a  Miss  Bevan, 
who  made  such  a  parade  of  her  undenied  virtues  that  they 
became  vices  in  the  eyes  of  her  colleagues. 

By  now  Mem  had  departed  so  far  from  her  early  training 
that  she  had  little  left  of  what  she  would  once  have  called 
common  decency.  She  went  extremely  decolleUe  to  dances; 
she  climbed  the  mountains  in  breeches  and  puttees;  and  on 
the  stage  she  wore  what  she  was  told  to  wear,  left  off  what 
she  was  told  to  leave  off,  without  thought  of  protest. 

Miss  Bevan,  however,  was  of  an  opposite  mind.  She 
considered  her  person  entirely  her  own  and  her  future  hus 
band's.  She  refused  to  wear  one  gown  because  it  was  too 
low  in  the  neck,  and  another  because  it  was  too  high  in  the 
skirt.  She  refused  to  be  photographed  actually  kissing  an 
actor  on  the  lips.  She  would  let  him  pretend  to  press  his 
mouth  against  her  cheek,  and  she  would  hide  her  face  behind 
his — but  no  more. 

In  one  scene  she  had  to  run  out  into  a  high  wind  in  a 
frenzy  of  terror.  The  airplane  propeller  twirled  her  skirts 
about  her  and  displayed  the  shapely  knees  the  Lord  had 
wasted  on  her.  She  forgot  the  overwhelming  emotion  of  her 
role  and  bent  to  clutch  down  her  spiraling  skirts. 

When  the  director  shouted  "Cut!"  she  was  distraught 
with  shame  and  demanded  that  he  retake  the  scene  and  tem 
per  the  wind  to  her  shorn  frock.  He  refused  with  disgust. 
She  insisted  then  that  the  picture  be  cut  before  the  wind 
displayed  her — her  limbs. 

The  director  answered:  "I'll  cut  the  scene  just  before  you 
began  to  hide  'em — not  because  the  public  is  interested  in 
your  legs,  but  because  I've  got  to  get  you  through  the 
door." 


36o  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

Miss  Bevan  was  frantic.  She  ran  to  Mem  and  poured  out 
her  woe. 

''I  think  that  director  is  the  most  indecent  person  in  the 
world.  Don't  you?" 

"No!"  Mem  snapped.    "But  I  think  you  are." 

Mem  despised  prudery  and  felt  that  such  maniac  modesty 
could  only  be  due  to  the  frenzy  of  a  mind  eternally  thinking 
evil.  Women  like  Miss  Bevan  seemed  to  her  to  squander 
important  energies  on  a  battle  with  dirt,  like  fanatic  house 
wives  who  devote  so  much  of  their  days  to  keeping  their 
homes  clean  that  they  have  no  time  to  accomplish  anything 
else. 

Mem  had  devoted  her  body  and  her  soul  to  her  public 
in  office  hours.  But  there  still  remained  much  idle  time 
for  mischief,  and  in  these  hours,  and  in  the  days  and  weeks 
between  pictures,  she  found  love  nagging  her  insufferably. 
She  was  in  the  humor  of  the  "Florodora"  maidens  whose 
motto  rang  through  her  mind,  "I  really  must  love  some  one 
and  it  might  as  well  be  you." 

The  "you"  was  almost  any  attractive  man  she  chanced 
to  be  with  at  the  time.  And  men  were  frequenting  her 
increasingly,  as  they  have  always  flocked  about  actresses, 
since  actresses  are  the  peaches  at  the  top  of  the  basket. 
The  stage  and  the  motion  pictures  offer  opportunity  to 
beauty  as  the  army  to  bravery,  the  church  to  piety,  the 
law  to  probity,  and  finance  to  ingenuity. 

Mem's  face  was  her  fortune  and  her  mind  was  its  steward. 
Her  perfection  of  mien  drew  people  to  her  as  a  lamp  draws 
a  wayfarer  or  a  pilgrim  or  a  moth.  Seekers  after  a  night's 
lodging,  a  month's  flirtation,  or  a  life's  companionship  saw 
her  from  afar  and  ran  to-her-wards. 

She  was  in  a  marriage  mood  and  her  heart  and  her  friends 
gave  her  conflicting  counsel:  Don't  marry  an  actor!  Don't 
marry  an  author!  Don't  marry  a  business  man!  Don't 
marry  anybody! 

But  the  "Florodora"  tune  kept  tinkling  in  her  heart. 
She  really  must  wed  some  one. 

Ned  Ling  was  one  of  Mem's  most  abject  worshipers.  He 
had  taught  her  the  mechanics  of  comedy,  and  helped  her 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  361 

tragedy  thereby.  Without  being  able  to  laugh  at  himself, 
he  taught  her  to  laugh  at  herself  and  at  him. 

He  grew  morbid  for  her.  He  cast  away  his  fears  of  love 
and  his  horror  of  marriage  and  his  sense  of  humor  at  the 
same  time. 

He  clung  to  her  hand  and  played  with  her  fingers,  lolled 
against  her  with  his  head  on  her  breast  and  implored  her 
to  be  his  mistress,  his  wife,  his  rescuer  from  despondency. 
But  his  caresses  were  like  the  fumblings  of  a  child  at  a  mater 
nal  bosom,  and  his  wildest  prayers  were  mere  childish 
naughtiness  to  her.  The  only  love  she  could  feel  for  him 
was  a  sense  of  amused  motherhood,  and  he  did  not  want 
that. 

He  flew  into  tempests  of  anger  at  her  unresponsiveness  and 
became  a  tragic  clown  at  whom  she  could  not  help  smiling. 

He  made  comic  exits  from  her  presence,  swearing  he  would 
never  see  her  again,  and  comic  returns.  But  Mem  would 
only  flirt  with  him,  and  with  anyone  else  who  amused  her. 

She  came  in  at  four  one  morning  after  a  party  given  to 
celebrate  Charles  Chaplin's  return  from  his  royal  progress 
through  Europe,  a  triumph  that  seemed  to  lift  the  whole 
motion-picture  world  in  the  person  of  its  representative. 
The  film  people  felt  that  they  were  at  last  a  nation  finding 
recognition,  as  when  the  emissary  of  a  republic  is  accepted 
as  an  ambassador. 

The  party  was  innocent  enough,  devoted  to  dances, 
charades,  impromptu  speeches,  imitations,  songs,  operatic 
burlesques,  and  an  almost  puerile  hilarity,  but  it  lasted 
almost  to  the  hour  when  good  children  are  getting  out  of 
bed. 

While  Mem  was  passing  through  this  phase  of  moral  and 
romantic  skepticism  and  experiment,  enacting  pretenses  of 
devout  love  before  the  camera  and  mocking  at  love  outside 
its  range,  and  her  mother  was  not  quite  sure  that  she  had  not 
quite  gone  to  the  devil,  her  first  pictures  were  going  about 
the  world  like  missionaries  winning  proselytes  to  her  shrine. 

The  whim  to  be  married  recurred  to  her  incessantly  and 
grew  to  a  fixed  purpose. 

It  appealed  to  her  various  moods  in  various  ways.    When 
24 


362  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

she  was  under  the  spell  of  her  home  training  marriage  was 
a  sacramental  duty.  When  she  heard  it  discussed  with 
cynicism  or  read  of  the  shipwreck  of  some  other  marriage, 
it  stirred  her  sporting  blood;  she  wanted  to  bet  she  could 
make  a  success  of  it.  When  she  was  in  an  amorous  fever 
it  recommended  itself  as  an  assurance  of  abundant  warmth 
and  safety.  When  she  was  lonely,  it  was  companionship. 
When  she  was  shocked  by  the  recklessness  of  others  or  by 
her  own  remorse,  it  was  respectability.  But  it  was  always 
something  unknown  that  she  wanted  to  know.  No  experi 
ence  of  life  could  be  complete  without  it. 

Tom  Holby  came  back  from  the  desert  browner  than 
ever,  less  subtle,  more  undeniable  than  ever.  He  fought 
hard  for  her  in  the  spirit  of  the  hero  he  was  playing  at  the 
time,  a  man  who  acted  on  the  theory  that  the  cave  man  is 
woman's  ideal  and  that  she  prefers  above  all  things  to  be 
caressed  with  a  club. 

But  these  highly  advertised  tactics  were  not  to  Mem's 
liking,  at  least  at  the  moment.  When  he  grew  too  fierce 
she  struck  him  in  the  mouth  with  a  fist  that  had  stout 
muscles  for  a  driving  bar,  and  she  brought  the  blood  to  his 
nose  with  a  slash  of  her  elbow. 

She  railed  at  his  awkward  confusion,  but  thereafter  she 
was  out  when  he  called. 


CHAPTER  LVI 

EVENTUALLY  she  met  Holby  at  the  golden-wedding 
anniversary  of  an  old  actor  who  had  been  on  the  stage 
since  boyhood,  had  married  a  young  and  pretty  actress  at 
twenty-one,  and  was  still  married  to  her  after  half  a  century 
of  pilgrimage  along  the  dramatic  highways. 

There  were  other  old  theatrical  couples  at  the  feast,  and 
they  made  wedlock  look  like  a  good  investment.  The  occa 
sion  was  exceedingly  benign,  and  Mem  was  so  gentled  that 
she  accepted  Tom  Holby's  apologies  and  his  company  home. 

"How  wonderful,"  she  said  on  the  palm-gloomed  way, 
"to  be  loved  by  one  man  for  fifty  years!" 

"I  could  love  you  for  a  hundred,"  Tom  groaned.  "Let's 
get  married  and  quit  wasting  so  much  time." 

Something  impelled  her  to  think  aloud: 

"You're  determined  to  play  the  simple  Septimus,  after 
all,  in  spite  of  the  censors." 

She  regretted  the  mad  indiscretion  an  instant  too  late. 
Holby  was  startled,  and  startled  her  by  his  quick  demand. 

"You  don't  mean  that  you  are  about  to — that  you  are 
going  to — to — " 

"No,"  she  said,  "but—" 

Like  a  child  or  a  dog,  the  simple  Holby  occasionally  had 
an  instinctive  understanding  of  something  unspoken.  He 
astounded  Mem  by  saying: 

"So  that's  why  you  were  hiding  in  Palm  Springs,  with 
that  phony  wedding  ring." 

"Tom!"  she  cried,  aghast  at  his  astounding  guess  at  the 
truth. 

"Forgive  me!"  he  grumbled. 

And  that  was  that.  Neither  of  them  ever  alluded  again 
to  the  subject.  Deeply  as  it  rankled  in  both  their  hearts, 
they  were  wise  enough  to  leave  buried  secrets  in  their  graves. 


364  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

But  in  spite  of  what  Holby  must  have  imagined,  he 
doggedly  persisted: 

"Let's  get  married." 

"In  spite  of — " 

"In  spite  of  everything!"  he  stormed.  "To-morrow  is 
the  nearest  day  there  is." 

She  loved  him  for  that  impetuous  determination  of  his. 
He  swept  her  past  aside  as  she  had  seen  him  conquer  other 
obstacles  —  avalanches,  thugs,  wild  animals,  terrors  that 
daunted  most  men. 

She  offered  a  weakening  resistance: 

"What  chance  of  happiness  could  we  have?" 

"As  much  as  anybody." 

She  had  to  make  an  old-fashioned  struggle,  but  her  reasons 
were  modern: 

"I  wouldn't  give  up  my  career  for  all  the  happiness  in 
the  world." 

He  had  evidently  been  thinking  that  matter  over  a  long 
while,  for  he  was  positively  glib: 

"I  don't  suppose  any  woman  ever  gave  up  her  career 
when  she  got  married." 

"How  do  you  mean?" 

' '  Most  women  have  been  brought  up  for  a  career  of  house 
keeping.  A  father  or  mother  told  them  what  to  do,  and 
scolded  them  when  they  did  something  else.  They  learned 
how  to  make  dresses  and  sew  and  cook,  and  that  was  their 
business.  When  they  married  they  just  moved  their  shop 
over  to  their  husband's  home,  and  expected  him  to  provide 
the  raw  stock  and  tell  them  what  to  do  and  scold  'em  if 
they  didn't  do  it,  or  spank  'em." 

This  struck  Mem  as  a  new  way  of  putting  an  old  story, 
but  she  saw  one  great  difference: 

"But  that  wife  lived  at  home  and  her  husband  knew 
where  to  find  her.  And  he  wouldn't  let  her  do  business 
with  any  other  customer.  In  our  lives,  if  we  lived  them 
together,  the  husband  would  be  away  from  home  half  the 
time." 

"So  is  the  average  husband,  with  his  store  and  his  lodge 
and  his  club." 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  365 

''But  then  there's  the  travel,  when  you're  on  location — 
or  when  I'd  be." 

"Travel  doesn't  keep  business  men  or  lecturers  or  soldiers 
or  sailors  from  marrying,  and  half  the  wives  in  the  world 
go  away  for  the  summer  or  the  winter  or  on  long  visits." 

"But  you'd  be  hugging  other  girls  before  the  camera — 
and  other  men  would  be  hugging  me." 

"As  long  as  it  didn't  mean  anything." 

"But  it  might  come  to — " 

"Well,  for  the  matter  of  that,  a  lot  of  hugging  goes  on  in 
a  lot  of  homes — and  outside  of  them.  I  was  reading  that 
most  of  the  girls  on  the  street  were  ruined  in  domestic 
service.  Chambermaids  and  cooks  are  pretty  dangerous 
things  around  a  house  for  husbands,  and  husbands  for  them. 
And  doctors  and  preachers  are  dangerous  to  wives.  It's  not 
a  nice  thing  to  say,  but  it's  true.  Then  there  are  the  ste 
nographers  in  the  offices,  and  the  salesladies  in  the  stores, 
and  the  cloak  models  and  cashiers  and —  Oh,  it's  a  busy 
little  world  and  it's  always  been  so.  The  old  patriarchs  had 
their  concubines  and  their  slaves  and  their  extra  wives.  No 
guaranty  ever  went  with  marriage  that  was  good  for  any 
thing,  and  there's  none  now.  We've  got  as  good  a  chance 
as  anybody." 

"But  what  if  we  should  fall  out?  Divorces  are  so  loath 
some." 

"They're  pretty  popular,  though.  They're  more  decent 
than  the  old  way — and  divorces  are  as  ancient  as  the  world. 
Moses  brought  down  from  heaven  the  easiest  system." 

"Yes,  but  Christ  said—" 

"Christ  said  nothing  about  a  woman  ever  getting  a  divorce 
at  all.  He  only  allowed  a  man  to  get  it  on  one  ground. 
But  a  good  deal  less  than  half  of  our  population  even  pre 
tends  to  belong  to  a  church — or  ever  did.  I  was  reading 
that  only  a  third  of  the  passengers  on  the  Mayflower  were 
Puritans.  You  can't  run  this  country  by  the  church,  espe 
cially  while  the  churches  don't  agree  on  any  one  thing. 
We'd  have  to  have  a  license  even  if  a  clergyman  should  marry 
us." 

Mem  was  shocked  by  the  possibility  of  a  civil  marriage. 


366  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

It  would  not  be  wedlock  at  all  unless  a  parson  sanctified  it. 
Holby  broke  in  upon  her  musings: 

"But  here  we  are  arguing.  Argument  is  death  to  love. 
Let's  love!  Let's  marry!  Let's  take  a  chance!  We  can't 
be  any  worse  off  than  we  are  now.  We'd  be  happy  for  a 
while ,  anyway. ' ' 

He  took  her  in  his  arms,  and  she  did  not  resist.  Neither 
did  she  surrender.  Her  mind  was  away,  and  her  voice  a 
remote  murmur: 

"How  long  could  it  last?" 

"We've  just  come  from  a  golden  wedding,  and  there 
were  couples  there  that  have  had  their  silver  anniversaries." 

"But  Jimmie  Coler  and  Edith  Minot  were  married  on 
Monday  and  separated  on  Tuesday.  And  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Gaines  have  lived  apart  for  years,  and  they  would  be  divorced 
if  she  weren't  a  Catholic.  And  the  Blisses  live  together,  but 
everybody  knows  their  other  affairs." 

"The  actors  are  no  unhappier  than  the  plumbers  or  the 
merchants.  We'd  have  as  good  a  chance  as  anybody.  We'd 
be  happy  for  a  while,  anyway.  Let's  take  a  chance!" 

But  Mem  was  not  in  a  gambling  mood.  She  withdrew 
herself  gently  from  his  relaxing  arms.  She  wanted  to  ponder 
a  while  longer. 

Marriage  was  a  subject  about  which  the  best  people  told 
the  most  lies.  If  you  are  truly  respectable  you  never  tell 
the  truth  about  marriage  or  religion,  and  you  never  permit 
it  to  be  told  in  your  presence. 

Mem  cherished  the  ancient  ideal  of  an  innocent  bride  going 
shyly  into  the  ward  of  a  husband  who  will  instruct  her  rev 
erently  into  awful  secrets. 

She  felt  that  she  had  somehow  lost  the  right  to  be  a  bride, 
for  there  were  no  secrets  to  tell  her.  How  could  she  enter 
a  school  when  she  was  already  postgraduate  in  its  classes  ? 

She  did  not  know  how  rare  such  ignorance  has  always 
been.  She  did  not  know  that  many  good,  wise  people  had 
felt  it  a  solemn  duty  to  instruct  little  boys  and  girls  in  all 
the  mysteries  long  before  they  came  to  nubility.  She  was 
not  yet  aware  of  the  new  morality  that  denies  the  virtue  or 
the  safety  of  ignorance  and  loathes  the  ancient  hypocrisies, 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  367 

the  evil  old  ideal  that  a  normal  man  wants  to  marry  a  female 
idiot. 

She  was  pitifully  convinced  that  she  was  unworthy  of 
Tom  Holby's  arms.  She  knew  that  he  had  led  the  average 
life.  She  did  not  expect  to  find  him  ignorant  of  life.  But 
that  had  never  been  expected  of  bridegrooms. 

It  was  from  a  deep  regard  for  him  that  she  denied  his 
prayer  and  went  sadly  to  her  solitary  room  as  to  a  cell  for  a 
fallen  woman.  Oh,  to  have  been  always  good! 

There  she  rebelled  against  her  doom.  She  grew  defiant. 
The  orange  tree  in  the  patio  had  both  fruit  and  blossoms. 
Her  heart  was  full  of  knowledge  and  yet  of  innocence.  She 
knew  the  live  coals  of  desire,  but  she  knew  also  the  hearth 
yearnings  of  the  bride.  She  had  the  steadfast  eagerness  of 
the  wife  to  bend  her  neck  to  the  yoke. 

She  loved  her  art.  She  loved  her  public.  She  felt  at 
times  immortal  yearnings,  immortal  assurances. 

The  doting  author,  Mr.  Hobbes,  waxed  lyrical  about  the 
future  of  the  movies.  He  was  as  much  of  a  scholar  as  his 
years  permitted,  and  he  mocked  the  contemptible  contempt 
of  the  cmemaphobes,  the  pompous  oldsters,  and  the  ridic 
ulous  preciosity  of  the  affected  youngsters  who  prated  of 
art  and  thought  it  meant  a  lifting  of  themselves  by  their 
own  boot  straps  above  the  heads  of  the  common  people. 

"They  make  me  sick,  the  pups!"  he  said.  "Chesterton 
said  it  when  he  said  that  some  of  the  talk  of  art  for  art's 
sake  made  him  want  to  shout,  'No  art,  for  God's  sake!' 

"When  the  skyscraper  was  new,  the  same  kind  of  poseurs 
howled  that  it  was  a  monstrosity — rotten  commercial  blot 
on  the  landscape — proof  that  the  Americans  were  hopeless 
Philistines.  Now  everybody  that  knows  says  that  the 
skyscraper  is  the  one  great  addition  to  architecture  that 
has  been  made  for  centuries — the  Greek,  the  Gothic,  the 
American. 

"When  the  drama  was  new  in  Athens  that  was  mocked  at, 
Euripides  was  the  popular  one  and  wrote  the  human  thing, 
the  sob  stuff  of  his  time.  And  Aristophanes  tore  him  to 
pieces  worse  than  anybody  ever  tore  the  cheapest  movie. 
He  said  that  Euripides'  stuff  had  all  gone  to  hell  already. 


368  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

And  now  we  revere  it.  And  Plato  spoke  of  'the  laugh  and 
the  tear*  just  as  we  do. 

"I  can  stand  the  contempt  of  these  whelps  better  than 
their  patronage.  I  see  red  when  they  say  that  the  movies  are 
cheap  and  trashy  stuff  now,  except  a  few  foreign  eccentrics 
like  '  Doctor  Caligari,'  but  that  they  will  some  day  be  great. 

"Some  day,  hell!  Pardon  my  French!  Some  day  is  yes 
terday.  Great  movies  were  done  from  the  start.  They 
sprang  full  armed  from  the  brow  of  Jove,  just  as  the  drama 
did,  and  the  skyscrapers,  and  the  novels.  They're  great  now. 
They  were  great  ten  years  ago.  Griffith's  '  Birth  of  a  Nation ' 
is  a  gigantic  classic.  His  '  Broken  Blossoms '  converted  a  lot 
of  highbrows  because  it  was  sad  and  hopeless,  but  happy 
endings  are  harder  to  contrive  than  the  tragic  ones,  and  no 
more  inartistic.  Then  there  are  all  the  big  directors:  Rex 
Ingram  a  sculptor  and  a  poet;  Reginald  Barker  with  his 
Scotch  grimness  and  tenderness;  Hopper  with  his  realism; 
Al  Green's  gayety  and  grace;  Henry  King,  Hayes  Hunter, 
the  two  De  Milles — all  passionate  hunters  of  beauty  and 
emotion. 

"It's  the  critics  that  are  small  and  always  late.  The  critics 
always  miss  the  express  and  come  up  on  the  slow  freight. 
They  always  discover  things  the  way  Columbus  discovered 
America,  after  it  had  been  here  a  million  years. 

' '  Think  how  marvelous  it  is  for  you  and  me  to  be  pioneers 
in  the  greatest  art  that  ever  was,  the  all-in-all  art.  We  are 
like  the  Greeks,  like  the  men  of  Chaucer's  time,  and  Shake 
speare's  time,  and  Fielding's.  We're  presiding  at  the  birth 
of  an  immortal  art.  Some  of  us  don't  know  it.  But  posterity 
will  know  it.  We're  among  the  immortals,  Miss  Steddon. 
Isn't  it  tremendous?" 

"It's  certainly  very  nice — if  it's  true!"  said  Mem,  who 
certainly  belonged  in  the  silent  drama. 

But,  as  usual,  her  face  was  inspired  with  the  emotion, 
though  her  words  flunked. 

Her  heart  swung  toward  the  author  now.  Hobbes  made 
love  to  her  in  the  thin  disguise  of  scenarios  and  schemes  for 
immortalizing  her  genius  and  his  own. 

The  partnership  of  an  author  and  an  actress  seemed  ideal. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  369 

But  when  she  was  out  of  Hobbes's  range  and  under  Tom 
Holby's  spell,  she  was  easily  convinced  that  the  ideal  part 
nership  was  an  actor  and  an  actress.  She  had  been  of  a 
mind  that  actress  and  director  made  the  perfect  combina 
tion.  Claymore  had  left  his  autograph  on  her  soul.  Then 
a  rich  man  wintering  at  Los  Angeles  fell  into  her  orbit  and 
began  to  circle  about  her  in  shortening  ellipses.  He  wanted 
to  put  ' '  big  money  "  back  of  her  and  organize  The  Remember 
Steddon  Productions,  Inc.,  and  make  pictures  exclusively 
for  her.  But  he  talked  so  large  and  was  so  large  that  he 
frightened  off  her  love,  and  the  wealth  of  Wall  Street,  that 
hell  of  iniquity  and  persecution  of  the  toilers,  seemed  to  be 
sobbing  away  like  the  last  water  in  a  leaky  tub. 

This  love  business  was  driving  Mem  frantic.  In  all  the 
pictures  she  had  played,  as  in  the  traditions  of  her  girlhood, 
love  was  a  thing  that  came  once  and  never  came  again. 
Good  women  knew  their  true  fate-mates  at  once  and  never 
swerved  in  their  devotion. 

Yet  here  she  was,  passionately  interested  in  several  gentle 
men,  finding  each  of  them  fascinating  just  so  far,  and  faultful 
thereafter.  Instead  of  giving  herself  meekly  to  the  bliss  of 
matrimony  she  was  debating  its  advisability,  practicability, 
and  profit.  She  must  be  at  heart  a  bad  woman;  one  of  those 
adventuresses. 

Either  fiction  was  very  untrue  to  life,  or  life  very  untrue 
to  fiction. 

Then  came  The  Pause.  Hard  times  struck  the  movies  so 
hard  that  in  the  studios  they  became  no  times  at  all.  The 
Disarmament  Convention  met  in  Washington  to  prepare  a 
naval  holiday  and  guarantee  another  end  to  war — war  that 
is  always  ending  and  never  ended. 

Most  of  the  motion-picture  factories  disarmed  entirely, 
and  the  rest  of  them  nearly.  The  Bermond  Studios  kept 
one  company  at  work,  and  it  was  not  Mem's  company. 

She  was  stricken  with  terror  as  she  confronted  her  prob 
lems.  The  smiling  future  was  a  dead  past.  The  garden 
land  of  Los  Angeles  had  reverted  to  the  desert. 

All  that  art  talk  suddenly  became  bread-and-butter  talk. 


370  SOULS    FOR   SALE 

What  could  she  do  now — not  to  perfect  her  fame,  but  to 
make  a  living?  She  would  be  poorer  than  her  father.  She 
would  have  to  discontinue  the  installments  of  that  "con 
science  fund"  which  he  had  learned  to  expect  from  Doctor 
Bretherick.  She  could  not  even  pay  the  installments  on 
numerous  vanities  she  had  bought  for  herself  from  the  shops. 

Her  lovers  were  as  defutured  as  herself.  Authors,  actors, 
directors — all — they  talked  poverty  instead  of  marriage. 


CHAPTER  LVII 

NO  one  had  talked  hard  times  longer  or  louder  than  Ber- 
mond.  He  had  been  mocked  at,  hated,  accused  of  greed 
when  he  cut  salaries  ruthlessly,  refused  to  renew  contracts, 
slowed  up  production.  Artists  said  it  was  a  cheap  excuse 
for  grabbing  more  profits.  Having  heard  him  croak  of 
disaster  so  long,  Mem  assumed  that  his  studio  would  be  one 
of  the  first  to  crash. 

Her  contract  would  be  canceled  or  rendered  worthless,  or 
its  provisions  interrupted  by  a  long  vacation.  Bermond  sent 
for  her  and  she  went  prepared  for  the  guillotine.  He  said : 

"I  like  you,  Miss  Steddon.  You've  worked  hard.  You've 
made  no  trouble.  You've  taken  good  care  of  yourself,  and 
in  every  picture  you're  a  little  better  than  before.  I  find 
that  the  exhibitors  are  wiring  in:  'Give  us  more  Steddon 
stuff.  Our  patrons  as  they  go  out  stop  to  say  how  much 
they  like  Steddon.  Why  don't  you  star  her?'  What  the 
exhibitors  say  goes — as  far  as  it  can. 

"  I  don't  want  to  fight  the  public,  though  I  try  to  give  them 
better  things  all  the  time. 

"We  can't  star  you  now.  All  our  stars  are  going  out. 
We  can't  put  any  more  money  in  pictures  till  we  sell  what 
we've  got  on  the  shelves. 

1 '  But  I  believe  in  you.  I  want  people  to  know  you.  And 
when  the  good  times  come  again  you  must  be  ready  for 
them.  So  I'll  go  on  paying  you  your  salary  and  send  you 
out  on  a  tour  of  personal  appearances. 

"Your  last  picture  looks  like  a  knock-out.  I'm  going  to 
take  down  Clive  Cleland's  name  and  feature  yours  alone. 
I  want  you  to  go  East — to  New  York  and  Boston,  Philly, 
Chi.,  all  the  big  cities,  and  let  the  people  see  you  when  they 
see  the  picture. 

"We'll  pay  your  traveling  expenses,  give  you  a  drawing- 


372  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

room — that  means  we  have  to  buy  two  tickets,  anyway, 
so  your  mother  can  go  along  as  our  guest.  We'll  give  you 
big  publicity — and  a  nice  time  in  every  city.  What  do  you 
say?" 

"Of  course!"  Mem  cried.    "And  it's  ever  so  kind  of  you." 

This  dazed  Bermond,  who  was  not  used  to  gratitude.  He 
gasped : 

"That's  nice!    All  right.     Go  home  and  pack  up." 

She  hastened  home,  and  her  heart  went  clickety-clickety 
with  the  lilting  thrill  of  her  first  railroad  voyage.  That  had 
taken  her  from  the  mid-West  to  the  Southwest.  Now  she 
was  to  triumph  back  across  the  mid-West  and  on  and  on  to 
the  Northeast,  the  Southeast,  the  two  borders,  the  two 
coasts,  and  all  the  towns  between. 

Remember  the  cinemite  was  going  forth  like  Peter  the 
Eremite  to  summon  people  to  her  banner  of  rescue,  of  sym 
pathy,  of  ardor. 

Her  mother  was  as  joyous  as  she.  The  crusade  was  a  new 
youth  to  her;  it  brought  belatedly  all  the  treasures  of 
experience  she  had  given  up  hoping  for.  The  best  she  had 
ever  expected  was  an  occasional  change  of  village,  to  move 
as  the  evicted  wife  of  a  poor  preacher,  from  one  parsonage 
whose  dullness  she  had  grown  used  to  to  a  new  boredom. 
Now  she  would  travel  like  a  dowager  empress  from  capital 
to  capital  as  the  mother,  the  author  of  a  famous  screen  queen. 

The  royal  progress  was  to  begin  with  a  transcontinental 
leap  to  New  York  to  assist  at  the  opening  of  the  picture  on 
Broadway — "On  Broadway!" — to  the  actor  what  "In 
Heaven!"  is  to  the  saint,  "In  Rome!"  to  the  priest,  "In 
Washington!"  to  the  politician,  "In  goal!"  to  the  athlete. 

The  abandoned  suitors  of  Mem  made  a  sorry  squad  at 
the  Santa  Fe  station.  They  stared  at  her  with  humiliated 
devotion. 

Bermond  sent  a  bushel  of  flowers  and  fruit  to  her  drawing- 
room.  He  saw  to  it  that  there  were  reporters  to  give  her  a 
good  send-off. 

She  left  Los  Angeles  another  woman  from  the  lorn,  lone 
thing  that  had  crept  into  the  terrifying  city,  as  so  many  sick 
lungers,  faint  hearters,  wounded  war  victims  had  crept  into 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  373 

it  and  found  it  a  restoring  fountain  of  health  and  hope  and 
ambition. 

She  waved  good-by  with  a  homesick  sorrow  in  her  eyes. 
Her  consolation  was  her  last  shout : 

"I'll  come  back !    I'll  come  back ! " 

She  had  a  little  of  the  feeling  Eve  must  have  had  as  she 
made  her  last  walk  down  the  quickset  paths  of  Eden  toward 
the  gate  that  would  not  open  again. 

The  train  stole  out  of  Eden  like  the  serpent  that  wheedled 
Eve  into  the  outer  world.  It  glided  through  opulent  Pasa 
dena  and  Redlands  and  San  Bernardino,  a  wilderness  of 
olives,  palms,  and  dangling  apples  of  gold  in  oceans  of  orange 
trees. 

By  and  by  came  Cajon  Pass,  where  the  train  began  to 
clamber  over  the  mountain  walls  that  were  the  gate  of  this 
paradise;  up  the  deep  ravine  known  as  Murder  Canon 
when  this  land  was  unattainable  until  a  pathway  of  human 
and  animal  bones  had  been  laid  down. 

Winter  was  waiting  on  the  other  side.  There  was  winter 
here,  too,  of  a  sort,  but  it  was  the  pretty  winter  of  southern 
California.  The  landscape  was  mooded  to  wistfulness. 
White  trees  were  all  aflutter  with  gilded  leaves  as  if  butterfly 
swarms  were  clinging  there,  wind  blown.  Soon  the  orange 
and  fig  trees  no  longer  enriched  the  scene.  Junipers  and 
cactus,  versatile  in  ugliness,  manzanita  and  Joshua  trees, 
were  the  emblems  of  nature's  poverty. 

Yet  there  was  something  dear  to  Mem  in  the  very  soil. 
She  could  have  kissed  the  ground  good-by,  as  Ulysses  flung 
himself  down  and  pressed  his  lips  on  the  good  earth  of  Ithaca. 

The  snow-sugared  crests  of  the  Cucamongas  and  Old 
Baldy's  bleak  majesty  were  stupendously  beautiful,  but 
they  seemed  to  be  only  monstrous  enlargements  of  the  tiny 
mountains  that  ants  and  beetles  climbed. 

As  the  train  lumbered  up  the  steep,  the  earth  passed 
before  Mem's  eyes  slowly,  slowly.  She  found  the  ground 
more  absorbing  than  the  peaks  or  the  sky.  She  stared 
inwardly  into  herself  and  the  common  people  that  she  sprang 
from  and  spoke  to.  She  found  them  the  same  as  the  giants 
— not  so  big  in  size,  but  infinitely  bigger  in  number. 


374  SOULS    FOR   SALE 

The  sierras  and  the  foothills  were  only  vast  totals  of 
minute  mountains.  She  found  the  world  wrinkles  of  the 
canons,  the  huge  slabs  of  rock  patched  with  rags  of  green, 
repeated  in  the  tiny  scratches  that  raindrops  had  made  in 
lumps  of  dirt.  The  wind  of  the  passing  train  sent  avalanches 
of  pebbly  dirt  rolling  through  forests  of  petty  weeds. 

Small  lizards  darted,  yet  were  not  so  fast  as  the  train  that 
kept  on  its  way  out  of  paradise,  winding  like  a  gorged  python. 
On  some  of  the  twists  of  track  she  could  see  its  double 
head  and  the  smoke  it  breathed.  The  mountains  appeared 
to  rise  with  the  train,  mocking  it  as  human  effort  is  always 
mocked  since  its  every  climb  discloses  new  heights;  every 
horizon  conquered  points  with  satiric  laughter  to  farther 
horizons  offered  for  a  prize. 

Meek  and  unimportant  as  the  little  pebbles  were  on  the 
slopes  of  the  mountains,  the  peaks  had  also  their  inequalities, 
and  looked  to  be  forever  snubbing  one  another. 

A  tunnel  killed  the  picture  like  a  broken  film.  Instantly 
Mem  imagined  Tom  Holby  at  her  side,  snatching  at  a  kiss. 
He  would  have  been  caught  in  the  theft,  for  the  mountains 
snapped  back  into  view,  only  to  be  blacked  out  again. 

There  would  have  been  time  for  a  long,  long  kiss,  for  many 
kisses,  in  this  rich  gloom.  Once  more  she  found  Tom  Holby 
wooing  her  best  in  his  absence.  She  wondered  if  she  were 
not  a  fool  to  leave  him.  He  had  told  her  that  he  had  saved 
money  enough  to  live  a  long  while  without  working;  to 
travel  abroad  with  her;  to  give  her  a  gorgeous  home.  But 
she  had  thought  of  her  ambition  and  followed  it. 

She  reviled  herself  for  her  automatic  discontent.  When 
she  saw  the  monotony  of  home  as  it  held  most  women  captive, 
she  was  glad  she  was  a  free  rover  in  art.  When  she  was  free 
and  roving  she  envied  them  their  luxury  of  repose. 

Now  she  was  by  herself.  Her  mother  was  nice;  but 
mothers  and  fathers  cannot  count  in  that  realm  of  the  heart. 

Finally  the  breathless  train  paused  at  the  top  of  its  climb. 
She  was  stung  with  an  impulse  to  step  down  and  take  the 
first  train  back. 

Here  she  was  at  Summit — with  a  capital  "S."  Yet  there 
was  nothing  much  to  see — a  red  frame  station  building  with 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  375 

dull  green  doors  and  windows,  a  chicken  yard,  a  red  water 
tank  on  stilts,  a  baggage  truck,  a  row  of  one-room  houses 
crowded  together  for  company  in  spite  of  the  too  abundant 
space. 

Probably  the  summit  of  success  would  be  about  the  same. 
The  fun  and  the  glory  were  in  the  scramble  up.  But  it 
seemed  lonely  and  uncomfortable  at  best  to  work  so  hard 
for  such  a  cold  reward.  And  she  had  left  orange  groves  and 
love  and  the  rich  shade  of  obscurity. 

Then  the  train  was  on  its  way  again,  the  helper  engine 
withdrawn  aside,  panting  with  exertion.  The  train  would 
coast  down  to  the  levels  without  help.  You  don't  need 
help  to  get  down.  Only,  when  you  get  down,  you  would 
find  desert  instead  of  a  bower. 

The  other  side  of  the  mountains,  after  all  the  effort  of 
getting  across,  would  be  like  crawling  back  of  a  tapestry  to 
study  the  seamy  side,  the  knots  and  the  patternless  waste. 

Still,  her  youthful  eagerness  always  served  as  an  antidote 
for  her  discontent.  The  desert  had  its  charms.  The  dead 
platitudinous  levels  made  easier  going.  Platitudes  were 
labor  saving  and  you  went  faster  and  safer  over  them.  And 
you  can  see  farther  on  the  level.  Up  high,  the  mountains 
get  in  one  another's  way,  as  do  jealous  artists  and  contra 
dictory  creeds. 

The  next  morning  found  the  desert  still  running  by.  The 
ground  was  as  brown  and  red  and  shaggy  as  the  hide  of  an 
ancient  squaw.  There  were  scabs  of  snow  in  the  wrinkles; 
in  the  air  an  annoyance  of  stingy  little  snowflakes. 

The  mountains  herealong  were  cruel  and  snarling.  They 
would  not  understand  the  yearning  for  warmth  because  they 
could  not.  They  were  cold  as  the  sierras  of  critics  that  Mem 
must  try  to  conquer.  But  she  could  feel  sorry  for  them  also. 
It  could  not  be  much  fun  to  be  cold  and  bleak  and  critical. 

The  cattle  sprinkled  about  the  region  were  working  hard 
for  sparse  fodder.  Life  was  like  that.  In  the  warm,  sweet 
summer,  food  and  drink  were  easy  to  get  and  luscious. 
Waking  was  a  dream,  and  sleeping  a  beatitude;  love  was 
balm  in  the  air.  In  the  winter,  though,  food  and  drink  were 
scant  and  harsh.  Waking  was  misery  and  sleep  a  shivering; 


376  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

love  hardly  more  than  two  waifs  shivering  together  to  keep 
warm. 

At  one  station  Indian  girls  ran  along  the  track,  offering 
gaudy  little , earthenware  baskets  and  bright  beadwork  they 
had  made — to  an  express  train  that  would  not  stop  long 
enough  even  for  such  passengers  as  would  take  the  trouble 
to  buy. 

The  girls  wore  striped  Navajo  shawls  that  were  not  warm 
enough.  Their  other  clothes  were  inappropriate,  somehow 
— civilized  garb  that  took  away  picturesqueness  and  con 
ferred  ugliness  instead  of  comfort — wrinkled  black  stockings, 
high  shoes,  pink  plaid  dresses. 

The  poor  things,  that  had  been  Indian  princesses! — a 
large  word  for  their  true  estate.  Yet  it  was  a  come-down 
from  the  primeval  cliff  caves  to  the  trackside  where  they 
offered  beads  for  pennies  to  the  palefaces  who  had  once 
swapped  beads  for  empires. 

Mem  saw  a  resemblance  to  herself  in  one  copper-colored 
maid  who  held  up  her  handiwork.  She  herself,  each  of  her 
fellow-creatures,  white,  brown,  red,  or  black,  was  but  a  poor, 
ignorant  savage  offering  some  crude  ware  to  busy  strangers 
drawn  past  in  an  express  train. 

It  was  self -consideration  as  much  as  sympathy  that  made 
her  hurry  to  the  platform  and  open  the  vestibule  door. 
She  wanted  to  buy  that  girl's  merchandise  so  that  people 
would  buy  her  own  soul  when  she  thrust  it  at  them. 

But  a  long,  dark  train  drew  into  the  station,  drove  the 
Indian  girl  back,  and  cut  off  all  communication.  It  reminded 
Mem  of  a  long,  hostile  criticism,  one  of  those  lumbering 
reviews  that  ran  over  her  own  heart  now  and  then,  because 
her  body  was  in  the  way,  and  because  the  train  came  from 
the  opposite  direction. 

Before  the  west-bound  train  drew  out,  her  own  moved  on 
and  she  never  saw  the  Indian  girl  again.  The  next  thing 
she  saw  on  that  side  was  a  saw  blade  of  mountains  gashing 
the  blue  sky  with  its  jagged  teeth. 

The  world  was  an  almighty  big  place.  There  was  so  much 
desert  and  then  so  much  farm  land,  so  many  large  cities. 

One  night  they  came  to  Kansas  City,  where  the  train 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  377 

waited  an  hour.  This  had  been  the  first  big  city  Mem  had 
ever  seen.  On  this  platform  she  had  met  Tom  Holby  and 
Robina  Teele,  never  dreaming  that  she  would  play  such 
havoc  in  his  cosmic  heart.  On  this  platform  she  had  bought 
her  first  moving-picture  magazines  and  her  soul  had  been 
rocked  by  her  first  knowledge  of  the  wild  things  women  were 
making  of  themselves. 

And  now  when  she  and  her  mother  went  up  to  the  vast 
waiting  room  and  she  bought  many  moving-picture  maga 
zines,  there  was  only  one  of  them  that  omitted  a  picture  of 
her  own,  and  that  magazine  promised  for  the  next  month  an 
article  about  her  as  the  most  promising  star  of  the  morrow. 

The  morrow  and  the  next  month!  What  would  they  do 
to  her  ?  What  would  she  do  the  world  next  month  ? 

The  immediate  morrow  found  her  on  the  train  again,  and 
staring  into  the  dark  in  a  blissful  forward-looking  nightmare. 
The  dark  was  like  the  inside  of  her  eyelids  when  they  closed, 
a  mystic  sky  of  purple  nebulas,  widening  circles  of  flame, 
crawling  rainbows,  infinitesimal  comets  rushing  through  the 
interstellar  deeps  of  her  eyelids. 

She  had  forced  her  mother  to  accept  the  full  space  of  the 
bed  made  up  on  the  two  seats;  she  chose  the  narrow  couch 
and  maidenly  solitude. 

She  slept  ill  that  night.  Or  rather,  she  lay  awake  well. 
Her  mind  was  an  eager  loom,  streaming  with  bright  threads 
that  flowed  into  tapestries  of  heroic  scope. 

She  was  a  personage  of  importance,  a  genius  with  a  future, 
an  artist  of  a  new  art,  the  youngest  and  the  best  of  the  arts, 
the  young  Pantagruel  born  about  the  year  that  she  was  born. 
It  had  already  bestridden  the  narrow  world  like  a  Colossus 
and  had  made  the  universal  language  a  fact.  She  was  speak 
ing  this  long-sought  Esperanto  for  everybody  to  understand. 

She  had  already  seen  clippings  from  London  newspapers 
referring  to  her  with  praise.  She  had  seen  in  a  South  Ameri 
can  magazine  a  picture  of  herself  as  Senorita  Remembera 
Steddon.  She  had  seen  a  full-page  picture  of  herself  in  a 
French  magazine  with  a  caption  referring  to  her  as  "une 
des  actrices  les  plus  belles  de  Veer  an." 

Her  art  was  good  to  her  and  she  must  be  good  to  it.    It 

25 


378  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

demanded  a  kind  of  celibacy,  as  some  religions  did.  Per 
fection  in  celibacy  was  not  often  attained  in  either  field, 
and  the  temptations  to  lawful  wedlock  and  stodgy  domes 
ticity  were  as  fierce  and  burning  as  to  lawless  whim. 

But  here  she  was  on  her  way  to  glory.  Yet  she  tossed 
in  loneliness !  A  pauper  of  love.  Well,  she  was  fulfilling  the 
newly  discovered  destiny  of  her  sex. 

During  the  night  the  train  crossed  the  meridian  that 
would  have  led  her  to  her  old  home  in  Calverly  and  her 
father.  He  had  advanced  a  little,  but  not  much  from  the 
most  ancient  patriarchal  ways,  from  the  time  when  a  father 
affianced  his  daughter,  before  she  left  her  cradle,  to  some 
boy  who  had  hardly  fallen  out  of  his,  and  married  her,  as 
soon  as  nature  permitted,  to  a  husband  she  had  perhaps 
never  seen  till  he  lifted  her  veil  and  led  her  away  to  a  prison 
called  home,  a  locked  stable  where  she  would  be  kept  for 
breeding  purposes  and  supplemented  with  other  mates  if 
she  failed  of  her  one  great  duty. 

They  had  thought  it  beautiful  not  so  long  ago  for  a 
fourteen-year-old  child  to  have  a  child.  Now,  in  the  more 
decent  states,  it  was  called  abduction  or  seduction  to  marry 
a  girl,  even  with  her  parents'  consent,  before  she  was  sixteen; 
the  husband  could  be  sent  to  prison  for  the  crime. 

To-day  all  the  American  women  were  voters;  millions 
of  them  were  independent  money  makers.  And  this  seemed 
right  to  Mem,  though  preachers  had  shrieked  that  it  meant 
the  end  of  all  morality.  But  morality  is  as  indestructible  as 
any  other  human  instinct.  The  obscene  old  ideal,  that 
reproduction  was  the  prime  obligation  of  womanhood, 
revolted  Mem.  What  was  the  use  of  devoting  one's  life 
merely  to  passing  life  along  to  another  generation?  The 
fish,  the  insects,  the  beasts  of  the  field,  did  that  much  and 
only  achieved  progressless  procession  round  and  round  the 
same  old  ring  of  instincts;  each  generation  handed  over 
like  a  slave  to  unborn  masters,  themselves  the  slaves  of  the 
unborn.  Who  profited? 

To  the  women  of  Mem's  time  and  mind  the  old-fashioned 
woman  was  neither  wise  nor  good,  but  a  futile  female  who 
deserved  the  slavery  she  accepted. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  379 

For  each  generation  to  climb  as  high  as  it  could  was  surely 
its  first  duty.  Love  would  take  care  that  successors  should 
be  born,  and  science  would  protect  the  young  better  than 
all  the  old  mother-murdering  systems.  It  was  only  in  the 
last  few  years  that  science,  freed  from  religious  meddling, 
had  checked  the  death  rate  that  had  slaughtered  infants  by 
the  billion  under  priestly  rule.  And  now  birth  control  was 
the  crying  need. 

Marriage  had  never  been  the  whole  duty  of  man,  and  Mem 
was  sure  that  never  again  would  it  be  the  whole  duty  of 
woman.  A  man  had  always  heretofore  felt  that  he  should 
assure  his  own  career  before  he  took  on  the  fetters  of  mat 
rimony.  And  a  woman  would  always  hereafter  feel  the 
same  thing. 

Terrible  euphemisms  for  slavishness  miscalled  meekness, 
submissiveness,  modesty,  piety,  propriety  had  been  held  as 
lashes  over  women  for  ages.  Now  whipping  was  out  of  style. 
A  girl  could  go  where  she  pleased  and  go  alone.  She  could 
take  care  of  herself  better  than  men  had  ever  taken  care  of 
her.  There  had  always  been  something  wrong  about  letting 
the  wolves  elect  themselves  as  guardians  of  the  ewe  lambs. 

Her  mother  was  with  Mem  and  that  satisfied  some  people. 
It  made  her  father  happier.  But  the  real  reason  for  her 
mother's  presence  was  that  Mem  wanted  the  poor  old  soul 
to  get  a  little  fun  out  of  life  before  it  was  too  late.  She  and 
her  mother  were  merely  young  girl  and  old  girl  in  a  globe 
trotting  adventure. 

Mem  was  still  awake,  or  was  wakened  from  a  half  sleep, 
when  the  racket  of  the  wheels  upon  the  rails  sounded  a 
deeper  note.  She  guessed  that  the  train  must  be  crossing  a 
bridge.  She  rose  and  leaned  softly  across  the  bed  where 
her  mother  dreamed  of  the  old  home  and  the  exhausting 
demands  of  her  children. 

Mem  lifted  the  edge  of  the  curtain  aside  a  little  and  peered 
out.  The  train  was  in  midair,  passing  through  a  channel 
of  rattling  girders.  The  vast  water  that  swept  beneath, 
moonlit  and  placid,  was  the  Mississippi,  going  South  in  the 
night.  It  would  soon  flow  past  Calverly.  She  remembered 
that  she  had  once  thought  of  drowning  herself  in  its  flood 


380  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

to  hide  her  shame  there  and  solve  her  problem.  The  equation 
of  all  the  #'s  and  y's  of  her  life  had  seemed  to  be  zero. 
Now  it  was  infinity.  How  wonderful  it  was  that  she  had  not 
yielded  to  despair !  It  gave  her  an  idea  for  a  picture. 

Nearly  everything  was  taking  the  scenario  form  in  her 
meditations  nowadays.  Wouldn't  it  make  a  great  film  to 
show  a  desperate  girl  flinging  herself  in  a  river  to  hide  her 
shame,  and  then  to  have  it  roll  before  her  the  life  she  might 
have  lived  if  she  had  not  drowned  herself  ?  Scenes  of  struggle 
and  triumph,  usefulness  and  helpfulness,  joy  and  love  could 
follow  and  then  fade  out  in  the  drifting  body  of  the  dead 
girl  who  had  lost  her  chance. 

Mem  saw  herself  in  the  role,  and  she  shivered  with  the 
delight  of  her  inspiration.  Then  she  sighed.  The  censors 
would  never  permit  the  film.  Girls  must  not  go  wrong  or 
commit  suicide  on  the  screen.  They  could  go  on  sinning  and 
slaying  in  real  life,  as  they  had  always  done  in  drama,  but 
the  screen  was  in  slavery  now  and  must  remember  its  cell. 

But  she  at  least  was  eastward-bound,  toward  the  morning 
that  was  marching  toward  her  beyond  the  somber  hills  of 
slumber.  She  breathed  deep  of  the  auroral  promise  in  the 
very  stars,  whose  light  was  dying  in  the  greater  light,  even 
while  they  lay  shuddering,  beads  of  quicksilver  scattered 
along  the  sky. 


CHAPTER  LVIII 

THE  next  Mem  knew  was  the  shudder  of  the  doorbell. 
The  porter  called  through  the  metal  panel  a  warning 
that  Chicago  was  loping  toward  them  out  of  the  east,  and 
they  must  make  ready  to  leave  the  train. 

They  scurried  to  get  up  and  pack  and  out.  Then  they 
went,  with  their  baggage,  across  the  roaring  streets  to  the 
Lake  Shore  station  and  got  breakfast  there — this  on  the 
advice  and  under  the  guidance  of  an  affable  gentleman  who 
met  them  and  said  that  he  represented  the  Bermond  Com 
pany's  Chicago  Exchange  and  had  been  ordered  by  Mr. 
Bermond  to  take  especial  care  of  Miss  Steddon.  Mem  tried 
to  look  as  if  she  were  used  to  such  distinction,  but  she  failed 
joyously. 

Half  a  day  was  all  they  had  for  learning  Chicago.  It  was 
even  larger  and  busier  than  Los  Angeles!  Mem  felt  lost 
and  ignored  until  she  saw  in  a  bulbous  glimmer  of  unlighted 
electric  letters  hung  in  front  of  a  big  motion-picture  theater 
the  name  of  her  latest  film.  The  theater  would  not  open 
until  eleven,  but  her  own  pictures  were  scattered  about  the 
lobby.  And  that  was  something  tremendous. 

She  and  her  mother  drank  deep  of  this  cup  of  fame.  They 
took  their  luncheons  scudding  on  the  Twentieth  Century 
Limited.  They  had  not  yet  left  Chicago  when  the  train 
stenographer  rapped  at  the  door  and  asked  their  names 
against  the  possibility  of  a  telegram.  Mem  noted  how  her 
mother  sat  a  little  higher  with  proud  humility  as  she  an 
swered  : 

"Miss  Remember  Steddon  and  mother!" 

There  were  italics  in  Mrs.  Steddon's  voice  and  exclamation 
points  in  the  stenographer's  eyes.  After  a  moment's  hesi 
tation,  as  his  pencil  stumbled  on  the  pad,  he  mumbled: 

"That  name  is  very  familiar  in  our  home,  if  you'll  excuse 


382  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

me.  The  wife  says  you  are  the  biggest  comer  of  them  all, 
and  I  must  say  I  agree  with  her,  if  you  don't  mind." 

Mem  didn't  mind.  She  gave  him  one  of  her  queenliest 
smiles,  and  concealed  her  own  agitation  until  he  had  closed 
the  door  on  his.  She  was  encountering  strangers  who  had 
loved  her  and  were  hopeful  for  her!  Wonderful! 

Winter  was  in  full  sway  outside,  but  the  train  slid  across 
the  white  world  like  a  skater,  and  there  was  a  lilt  in  its  rush. 
The  next  morning  found  the  Hudson  alongside,  moving 
slowly  under  its  plate  mail  of  ice  to  New  York. 

Mrs.  Steddon  loyally  denounced  the  river  as  far  inferior 
to  her  own  Mississippi,  but  Mem  found  the  New  York  stream 
better  groomed,  somehow.  It  seemed  to  be  used  to  great 
cities.  It  led  on  to  the  metropolis  of  metropolites,  the  New 
York  that  she  was  come  to  conquer.  She  wondered  if  the 
city  would  be  nice  to  her.  She  had  heard  that  it  had  a  mind 
of  its  own  and  that  it  never  knew  who  came  or  went.  Yet 
the  Chicago  courier  had  said  that  New  York  was  "the 
hickest  village  in  the  U.  S.  A.,  just  a  bundle  of  small  towns." 

Whatever  it  was,  it  was  destiny.  Yet  here  again  the  long 
arms  of  Bermond  had  provided  her  with  a  reception  com 
mittee — a  most  affable  gentleman  from  the  New  York  office, 
and  two  photographers,  one  with  a  motion  camera,  also  two 
or  three  young  reporters  whose  stories  would  never  be  pub 
lished.  But  neither  they  nor  Mem  knew  this  and  she  under 
went  the  pleasant  anguish  of  being  interviewed  on  the  station 
platform. 

Rooms  had  been  reserved  for  her  at  the  Gotham,  and 
she  went  thither  in  a  covey  of  attendants.  It  was  a  good  deal 
of  high  life  for  a  young  girl,  and  when  she  and  her  mother 
were  left  alone  aloft  in  luxury,  she  flung  herself  down  on  a 
divan  and  lay  supine,  another  Danae  smothered  under  the 
raining  favors  of  the  gods  on  high. 

There  was  more  and  more  to  come.  Her  experience  of 
the  city  had  been  experienced  by  millions  of  visitors,  to 
whom  the  high  buildings,  the  Metropolitan  Opera,  the 
Metropolitan  Art  Museum,  the  Aquarium  and  other  things 
metropolitan  were  the  realization  of  old  dreams. 

She  went  to  a  theater  or  an  opera  every  night,  and  to  a 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  383 

matinee  every  afternoon  when  there  was  one.  And  she 
marveled  that  her  father's  religion  had  set  the  curse  of  denial 
upon  the  whole  cloud  realm  of  the  drama.  On  Sundays,  the 
theaters  were  closed  except  to  "sacred  concerts,"  but  the 
good  people  who  were  trying  to  close  the  motion-picture 
houses  had  not  yet  succeeded. 

On  her  first  Sunday  night  in  town  she  and  her  mother  went 
to  the  Capitol,  the  supreme  word  in  motion-picture  exhi 
bition.  The  new  art  had  already  in  this  building  the  largest 
theater  in  the  world.  From  its  vast  foyer,  illuminated  with 
mural  paintings  by  William  Cotton,  a  marble  stairway 
mounted  nobly  to  a  balcony  as  big  as  a  lake  above  a  lower 
ocean,  both  levels  peopled  with  such  a  multitude  that  their 
heads  were  mere  stippling. 

The  architecture  seemed  perfection  to  Mem — perfection 
with  grandeur,  yet  of  an  indefinable  exquisiteness.  Every 
thing  was  Roman  or  Etruscan  gold.  There  was  a  forest  of 
columns  as  tall  as  the  sequoias  of  California,  a  grove  of 
gilded  trees,  fluted  and  capped  in  splendor. 

The  sweeping  curve  of  the  balcony  was  like  a  bay  along 
the  Santa  Monica  coast.  Here  long  divans  gave  the  spec 
tator  a  Persian  luxury.  From  somewhere  back  of  beyond 
the  projection  machines  sent  their  titanic  brushes  and  spread 
miracles  on  the  immense  screen.  More  than  five  thousand 
people  were  seated  there,  and  a  varied  feast  was  served 
them. 

Before  the  pictures  was  a  Rothapfelian  divertisement.  A 
pipe  organ  roared  its  harmonious  thunders  abroad  until  an 
orchestra  of  seventy  men  sat  down  before  a  curtain  of  futur 
istic  art  and  played  a  classic  overture.  Then  the  curtains 
drew  back  and  to  one  of  Brahms 's  Hungarian  dances  a 
booted  girl  in  white  Hussar  uniform  with  a  cloak  of  scarlet 
flying  from  one  shoulder  and  one  hip,  flung  her  nimble  limbs 
about  the  stage.  A  basso  profundo  sang;  and  there  was  a 
ballet  in  gray  translucent  silhouette  against  a  shimmer  of 
glowing  cream. 

The  first  picture  was  one  of  the  Bible  stories,  to  whose 
prestige  the  censors  permitted  almost  complete  nudity  and 
horrific  crimes  denied  the  secular  films.  A  tenor  sang.  A 


384  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

news  picture  unrolled  scenes  from  all  the  world.  Then  came 
a  prologue  to  the  film  de  resistance. 

To-night  it  was  "The  Silent  Call,"  by  Laurence  Trimble 
and  Jane  Murfin.  The  authoress,  as  Mem  had  heard,  had 
bought  a  police  dog  abroad  at  a  cost  of  five  thousand  dollars 
and  trained  it  tirelessly  to  be  the  hero  in  the  story  by  Hal 
G.  Evarts. 

The  theme  was  the  cross-pull  between  the  wolf  and  the 
dog  in  the  poor  beast's  heart,  and  the  amazing  animal  enacted 
all  the  moods  from  devotion  to  man  and  the  gentleness  that 
the  dog  has  mysteriously  learned,  to  the  wild  raven  and 
man  hate  that  the  wolf  has  never  unlearned.  There  was  no 
supercanine  psychology,  only  the  moods  and  passions  of  the 
animal;  but  they  were  deep,  passionate,  sincere. 

With  this  two-souled,  four-footed  protagonist  the  com 
pany  had  gone  into  the  snowy  wilderness  and  brought  back 
a  wonderland  of  white  crags,  stormy  skies,  cruel  men  and 
brave. 

The  dog  eloped  with  a  white  wolf  ess,  and  proved  a  good 
husband  and  father  until  his  household  was  destroyed  by 
relentless  man.  Then  he  went  back  to  doghood,  fought  for 
the  sore-beset  heroine,  fondled  the  fearless  hero,  pursued  and 
tore  to  pieces  the  savage  villain  with  fiercer  savagery.  In 
all  his  humors  he  was  irresistible,  a  brave,  sweet  soul;  and 
there  was  incessant  felicity  in  the  composition  of  the  pictures 
he  dignified.  The  highest  inspirations  of  landscape  art  were 
manifest. 

Fifteen  thousand  people  saw  the  dog  play  his  role  that 
Sunday  in  that  one  room,  and  a  whole  herd  of  him  was  play 
ing  in  other  theaters  throughout  the  country.  He  would 
gallop  around  the  globe,  that  dog. 

The  moral  of  it  all  to  Mem  was  despair  of  man.  She 
poured  her  heart  out  to  her  mother  in  the  language  of  one 
trained  in  churchliness ;  for  the  rebel  cannot  escape  his  past. 

"What  better  things  could  anybody  learn  in  a  church 
than  here, mamma?  Aren't  God's  gifts  developed?  Isn't  he 
praised  in  color  and  music  and  sermon  and  sympathy?  It's 
all  hymns  to  me — hymns  of  light  and  sound,  sacred  dances 
and  travel  into  the  noblest  scenes  God  ever  made. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  385 

"  Yet  they  call  it  a  sin  even  to  go  there,  and  they  say  there 
is  a  bill  coming  up  to  close  all  the  theaters  as  well  as  the 
barber  shops  and  delicatessens  on  Sunday,  so  as  to  drive  the 
people  to  church  or  force  them  to  stay  at  home  in  dullness 
— poor  souls  that  work  all  week  and  don't  want  to  go  to  a 
dull  church  and  sleep  before  a  dull  preacher.  They  don't 
want  to  be  preached  at;  they  want  to  be  entertained. 

"What  on  earth  makes  good  people  so  bad? — and  so 
stupid  ?  They've  been  trying  for  ten  thousand  years  to  scold 
and  whip  people  to  be  good  their  way,  and  they've  never 
succeeded  yet.  That  ought  to  show  them  that  God  is  not 
with  them  or  he  wouldn't  put  it  in  people's  hearts  to  fight 
the  cruelty  of  the  good  just  as  hard  as  they  fight  the  cruelty 
of  the  bad. 

"According  to  them  I'm  a  lost  soul  on  my  way  to  hell. 
Yet  my  heart  tells  me  that  I'm  leading  a  far,  far,  far  more 
worshipful  life  building  pictures  than  I  ever  could  have  done 
back  there  in  Calverly,  if  I'd  stayed  there  and  been  good  and 
married  a  good  man  and  gone  nowhere  but  to  church  and  the 
kitchen  and  the  nursery  all  my  days. 

"And  look  at  that  biblical  picture  to-night!  I  saw  the 
one  before  with  Adam  and  Eve — both  stark  naked  except 
for  a  few  bushes.  They'd  have  put  the  actress  in  jail  if  she 
had  played  like  that  in  anything  but  a  Bible  story.  If  religion 
can  sanctify  a  thing,  why  can't  art?  And  when  Adam  and 
Eve  clothed  themselves  they  only  put  on  a  few  leaves. 
If  that  was  costume  enough  then,  why  should  we  have  to 
wear  long  skirts  and  high  bodices  now? 

"They  give  prizes  to  little  girls  to  read  the  Bible  through 
from  cover  to  cover.  Even  papa  praises  that  as  a  soul-saving 
thing!  He  made  me  read  it  all,  and  it  includes  the  Songs  of 
Solomon  and  a  hundred  stories  that  leave  nothing  horrible 
untold." 

"Are  you  talking  against  the  Bible?"  her  mother  bristled. 

"No,  I  think  it  is  all  that  papa  believes.  I  think  it  is  a 
good  thing  for  children  and  grown-ups  to  know  by  heart. 
But  what  stumps  me  is  the  inconsistency  of  the  professional 
soul  savers  who  want  the  law  to  prevent  grown-up  people 
from  seeing  things  that  children  are  encouraged  to  read. 


386  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

In  Los  Angeles  I  saw  one  of  William  de  Mille's  pictures  where 
a  pious  Boer  was  reading  from  The  Songs  of  Solomon,  and 
when  they  quoted  what  he  was  reading  they  had  to  blot  out 
part  of  it  on  the  title  card.  Think  of  that,  mamma!  Yet 
the  Book  is  in  every  Christian  home,  or  is  supposed  to  be." 

"You're  not  arguing  that  it  oughtn't  to  be?" 

"Of  course  not!  The  Bible  never  harmed  anybody.  But 
neither  did  the  screen,  really.  The  crime  is  in  robbing  the 
film  of  all  freedom  and  making  it  the  slave  of  all  the  old 
women  of  both  sexes." 

The  subject  was  intensely  uncomfortable  for  her  mother. 
As  with  most  people,  morality  was  a  subject  that  she  thought 
unfit  for  discussion.  Nice  people  had  morals  as  well  as 
bowels,  but  believed  that  their  irregularities  should  remain 
equally  unchronicled. 

Mrs.  Steddon  yawned  and  said  that  she  was  going  to  bed. 
It  was  late,  and  Mem  turned  in,  too. 

In  the  meanwhile,  in  the  great  rhythm  of  the  world  the 
Puritans  were  on  the  upswing  as  so  often  before.  They 
would  gain  the  barren,  artless  height  of  their  ideals,  and  then 
the  billow  would  break  and  carry  them  snarling  back  to  the 
trough  of  the  sea  while  the  merrymakers  swept  up  to  their 
frothy  supremes  of  license,  only  to  lapse  to  defeat  with  equal 
impermanence  of  either  failure  or  success. 

The  world  was  apparently  in  for  a  gray  Sabbath  and  it 
would  satisfy  nobody  any  more  than  the  last  or  the  next 
Saturnalia.  Censorship  had  already  taken  the  moving  pic 
tures  almost  altogether  out  of  the  realm  of  freedom,  and 
the  peoples  of  the  theaters,  the  magazines,  the  books,  the 
paintings,  the  fashions,  the  shops,  were  already  murmuring 
in  dread,  "We're  next!" 

But  yet  awhile  there  was  mirth  and  beauty,  though  the 
shackles  rattled  when  the  feet  danced  too  high  or  ran  too  far. 

Whatever  the  fate  of  her  art,  Mem  was  flying  high.  The 
papers  of  New  York  were  publishing  her  engaging  eyes, 
the  billboards  all  about  town  were  announcing  her,  and  in 
paragraph  and  advertisement  she  was  celebrated.  But  so 
many  others  were  also  claiming  the  public  eye!  other  new 
comers  and  favorites  in  impregnable  esteem. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  387 

People  who  had  come  from  Calverly  were  claiming  Mem 
as  a  fellow-citizen  and  feeling  that  they  gained  some  mystic 
authority  from  mere  vicinage.  Some  of  them  called  upon 
her  in  person  or  by  telephone  and  set  her  heart  agog.  She 
wanted  to  do  them  and  the  town  justice. 

Somehow  she  endured  until  the  night  her  own  picture  was 
shown,  and  then  stepped  out  before  what  seemed  to  be  the 
world  in  convention  assembled.  She  felt  as  tiny  as  she  looked 
to  the  farthest  girl  in  the  ultimate  seat  up  under  the  back 
rafters. 

She  parroted  the  little  speech  that  Bermond's  publicity 
man  had  written  for  her,  and  afterward  wondered  what  she 
had  said.  There  was  a  cloudburst  of  handclapping  and  a 
salvo  from  the  orchestra  that  swept  her  from  the  stage  into 
the  wings. 

And  that  was  tnat ! 

She  did  not  know  that  one  of  the  town's  wealthiest  men 
was  lolling  in  a  fauteuil  down  front  and  that  her  beauty  and 
her  terror  smote  him. 

His  motto  had  been,  "Go  after  what  you  want,  and  bring 
it  home!"  He  prided  himself  on  being  a  go-getter  who  had 
not  often  come  back  foiled.  He  wanted  Mem  and  he  went 
after  her.  He  was  willing  even  to  bring  her  home. 


CHAPTER  LIX 

r~pHERE  was  no  difficulty  about  meeting  Mem  for  a  man 
1  whose  name  smelled  of  millions  honestly  amassed  and 
gracefully  dispersed. 

Austin  Boas  came  humbly  to  Mem  to  pay  his  respects, 
and  his  enormous  name  made  her  tremble  as  her  bisque 
daintiness  set  him  aquiver.  He  was  shy,  ashamed  of  his 
own  lack  of  heroic  beauty;  and  Mem  was  dazed  to  find 
herself  feeling  sorry  for  him.  Pity  was  a  dangerous  mood 
for  her. 

Boas  gazed  at  her  with  eyes  as  hungry  and  as  winning  as 
the  eyes  of  the  dog  Strongheart.  Like  the  dog,  he  was  earning 
wealth  that  he  could  not  spend  for  his  own  happiness.  And 
his  longing  was  for  caresses  and  devotion.  He  would  give 
his  life  to  one  who  would  rub  his  head. 

If  Boas  had  had  any  lurking  thought  of  dazzling  Mem  into 
a  mercenary  submission  to  his  caprice,  he  never  revealed  it. 

He  was  not  at  all  the  vicious  capitalist  she  had  read  about 
and  seen  in  so  much  film,  bribing  poor  gels  to  dishonor. 

He  sent  her  flowers,  but  they  were  pretty  and  appealing 
rather  than  expensive.  He  made  no  proffer  of  jewelry, 
never  suggested  money.  Life,  she  found,  rarely  ran  true  to 
fiction. 

Mrs.  Steddon  was  usually  in  tne  offing,  and  Boas  may  have 
thought  that  she  was  one  of  those  canny  mother  managers 
who  try  to  force  rich  gallants  into  matrimony.  But  when 
Mrs.  Steddon  was  out  of  sight  Mem  was  a  little  more  elusive 
than  ever. 

Boas  revealed  to  her  phases  of  opulence  that  she  had  never 
imagined.  The  most  striking  thing  about  them  to  her  was 
that  they  were  not  so  very  opulent,  after  all.  His  home  was 
somber  and  dull,  his  servants  cozy  old  neighbors,  his  own 
manner  humble.  His  art  gallery,  when  he  led  her  and  her 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  389 

mother  into  it,  was  severe,  a  mere  background  for  paintings; 
and,  after  all,  not  many  paintings  there.  Mem  knew  noth 
ing  about  the  virtues  of  what  she  saw  and  she  cried  out 
equally  over  the  things  he  had  bought  by  mistake  and  the 
happy  investments.  The  Boas  automobile,  which  carried 
them  to  and  from  their  hotel,  was  a  good  car,  but  exceedingly 
quiet.  Mem  had  ridden  in  a  dozen  in  Los  Angeles  that  were 
far  more  gorgeous. 

But  Boas  was  lonely.  He  was  pathetic.  He  reminded  her 
somehow  of  Ned  Ling,  who  squandered  joy  and  kept  none. 
Boas  was  drowned  in  wealth  and  was  poor. 

He  might  have  won  Mem  via  pity,  if  he  had  not  tried  to 
win  her  from  her  career.  He  was  a  monopolist  by  inheritance, 
and  he  wanted  all  there  was  of  Mem. 

He  promised  her  everything  that  money  could  buy  or 
love  could  propose,  with  the  one  proviso  that  the  money 
should  not  be  her  own  earning,  but  his  gift,  and  that  the 
public  should  see  her  no  more. 

Mrs.  Steddon  was  all  for  him.  She  pointed  out  to  Mem 
how  good  the  Lord  was  in  sending  her  such  a  catch.  She 
emphasized  the  good  she  could  do  with  millions;  the  poor 
she  could  feed  and  clothe;  the  churches  she  could  adorn  or 
build ;  the  missions  she  could  endow.  But  a  parent's  recom 
mendation  is  the  poorest  character  a  lover  can  possess. 

Contradictory  torments  wrung  Mem's  heart.  She  was 
human  enough  to  covet  ease  and  the  hauteur  of  money, 
but  she  had  outgrown  the  ability  to  enjoy,  or  even  endure, 
the  old-fashioned  parasitism  of  the  woman  who  takes  and 
takes  and  takes. 

Girls  had  decided  that  it  was  no  longer  flattery  or  good 
wooing  to  be  offered  a  life  of  nonentity.  Who  wanted  to  be 
anybody's  silly  Curlylocks? — and  accept  as  a  compliment 
the  promise,  "Thou  shalt  not  wash  dishes  nor  yet  feed  the 
swine,  but  sit  on  a  cushion  and  sew  a  fine  seam,  and  feed 
upon  strawberries,  sugar,  and  cream." 

Boas  had  one  terrific  rival,  the  many-headed  monster. 

It  is  not  hard  to  seduce  an  actress  from  the  stage,  but  it  is 
hard  to  keep  her  off.  There  is  a  courtship  that  the  public 
alone  can  offer,  and  no  one  man  can  give  her  as  much  applause 


3QO  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

as  a  nightly  throng's.  That  form  of  polyandry  is  irresistible 
to  most  of  the  women  who  have  been  lucky  enough  to  get 
on  the  stage  or  the  screen  and  to  win  success  there. 

One  day  Bermond  summoned  her  to  his  New  York  office 
and  said: 

"How  about  getting  to  work  again?  I've  got  a  great  story 
for  you  and  they  need  you  at  the  studio.  On  your  way 
back  you  can  make  personal  appearances  at  four  or  five 
cities,  but  it's  back  on  the  job  for  you,  eh?  That's  right! 
That's  a  good  girl!" 

Bermond  offered  Mem  neither  ease  nor  devotion — except 
devotion  to  her  publication.  He  offered  her  toil  and  wages, 
hardships  and  discontent,  sleepless  malaise,  and  bad  press 
notices. 

And  she  could  have  flung  her  arms  about  him  and  kissed 
him. 

Austin  Boas  was  at  the  station  to  see  Mem  off.  For  his 
last  fling  he  filled  her  drawing-room  with  flowers — poor 
things  that  drooped  and  died  and  were  flung  from  the  plat 
form  by  the  porter. 

Long  after  their  spell  had  been  forgotten,  the  sad  gaze  of 
Boas  as  he  cried  good-by  haunted  her. 

It  was  her  increasing  regret  that  she  could  not  love  every 
body  and  give  herself  to  everybody  wrho  wanted  her.  Being 
unable  to  distribute  herself  to  the  multitudes  by  any  miracle 
as  of  the  loaves  and  fishes,  she  withheld  herself  and  scattered 
photographs  by  the  hundred  thousand. 

She  had  murmured  to  Boas,  "When  I  make  another 
picture  or  two  I  may  decide  to  be  sensible,  and  then — if 
you  are  still — " 

"I  shall  be  waiting,"  said  Boas.  And  he  gave  up  with  a 
groan:  "Marry  me  anyway  and  have  your  career,  too.  I'll 
put  my  money  into  your  company.  I'll  back  you  to  the  limit. 
I'll—" 

That  staggered  her,  but  before  she  could  even  think  up  an 
answer  the  train  started  and  divorced  her  from  him — for 
the  present,  at  least. 

At  Buffalo  and  at  Cleveland  she  paused  to  come  before 
huge  audiences  and  prattle  her  little  piece.  When  she 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  391 

reached  Chicago  she  found  awaiting  her  a  long  letter  from 
the  manager  of  the  moving-picture  house  in  Calverly.  He 
implored  her  to  visit  her  old  home  town  and  make  an  appear 
ance  at  his  theater.  He  promised  that  everybody  would  be 
there. 

This  was  success  indeed!  To  appear  in  New  York  was 
triumph,  but  to  appear  in  her  native  village  was  almost  a 
divine  vengeance. 

She  had  resolved  to  leave  her  mother  at  Calverly,  in  any 
case.  Mrs.  Steddon  was  wearying  of  adventure  and  her 
heart  had  endured  too  long  an  absence  from  her  husband 
and  the  other  children.  The  younger  sister,  Gladys,  had 
done  her  best  to  take  her  mother's  place,  but  Mrs.  Steddon's 
real  career  was  her  family  and  Mem  knew  that  she  was 
aching  to  get  back  to  it. 

And  so  one  morning  they  crossed  the  Mississippi  again. 
At  Burlington  they  must  leave  the  train,  wait  two  hours, 
and  then  ride  south  to  Calverly. 

As  Mem  and  her  mother  stepped  down  from  their  car  in 
Iowa,  both  gasped  and  clutched. 

The  Reverend  Doctor  Steddon  was  a  few  yards  away  from 
them,  studying  the  off-getting  passengers. 

"Let's  see  if  he  knows  us,"  snickered  Mrs.  Steddon,  with 
a  relapse  to  girlishness. 

"Let's!"  said  Mem. 

They  knew  him  instantly,  of  course.  He  wore  the  same 
suit  they  had  left  him  in,  and  the  only  change  they  could 
descry  was  a  little  more  white  in  a  little  less  hair. 

But  he  did  not  know  them  at  all.  It  amused  them  to  pass 
him  by  and  note  his  casual  glance  at  the  smart  hat  and  the 
polite  traveling  suit  of  his  wife.  He  had  expected  a  change 
in  his  daughter,  but  he  was  probably  braced  for  something 
loud  and  gaudy.  Mem  looked  really  younger  than  when  she 
left  him.  She  had  then  been  a  premature  old  maid,  dowdy 
and  repressed.  Now,  for  all  her  girlishness,  she  was  a  lithe 
siren,  her  eyes  knowing,  her  too  expressive  body  carried 
learnedly  in  clothes  that  boasted  of  what  they  hid,  boasted 
subtly  but  all  the  more  effectively.  In  spite  of  the  emphatic 
modesty  of  her  clothes,  Mem  had  lived  so  long  among  butter- 


392  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

flies  and  orchids,  and  had  striven  so  desperately  for  expres 
sion,  that  she  did  not  realize  how  emphatic  she  was. 

So  her  father  passed  her  by.  When  Mrs.  Steddon  turned 
and  hailed  him  in  a  voice  that  was  gladder  and  more  tender 
than  she  knew,  he  whirled  with  his  heart  bounding. 

Then  he  paused  and  stared r  befuddled,  at  the  tailor-made 
model  running  toward  him. 

He  knew  all  about  the  other  world  and  how  to  get  there, 
but  he  was  lost  in  the  cities  of  the  earth.  When  his  wife 
rushed  into  the  arms  he  had  flung  open  to  her  voice,  he 
was  almost  afraid  to  close  them  about  her.  He  felt  a  bit 
like  Joseph  with  the  captain's  wife  clinging  to  him. 

When  he  stared  across  her  trim  shoulders  and  took  in 
"the  sumptuous  Delilah  floating"  toward  him  with  his 
daughter's  countersign,  "Poppa!"  he  was  aghast  at  her 
beauty.  She  was  ungodly  beautiful. 

Long  ago,  when  she  had  sung  in  the  choir,  he  had  noted 
with  alarm  an  almost  indecent  fervor  in  her  hymning.  Now 
she  had  learned  to  release  all  the  fragrances  and  allurements 
of  her  being  like  a  Pandora's  box  broken  open. 

And  now  he  felt  that  he  ought  to  avert  his  gaze  from  her 
too  lovely,  too  luscious  charm.  He  shut  his  eyes,  instead, 
and  drew  her  into  his  bosom  with  one  long  arm,  and  his  wife 
with  the  other.  And  they  heard  his  hungry,  feasting  heart 
groaning : 

"I  thank  Thee,  O  God!  Now  lettest  Thou  Thy  servant 
depart  in  peace." 

But  neither  the  Lord  nor  his  family  granted  that  prayer. 
His  two  children  chattered  at  once.  Both  seemed  children 
to  him.  His  wife  had  turned  time  far  back;  she  looked 
fairer  than  he  had  ever  known  her;  and  her  traveling  hat 
hid  her  gray- white  hair.  Poor  thing !  She  had  never  known 
till  this  year  the  rapture  of  being  fashionable;  had  never 
dared,  never  understood  how,  to  look  her  best. 

Hiding  under  his  high  chin,  Mem  begged  his  forgiveness 
for  all  the  heartaches  she  had  caused  him.  She  wept  on  his 
white  bow  tie,  twisting  a  button  on  his  coat  and  pouring  out 
her  regret  for  dragging  his  wife  away  from  him  and  causing 
them  to  quarrel  over  her. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  393 

These  tears,  these  gestures  of  pathos,  were  endearing  her 
to  the  multitudes,  who  saw  her  half  the  time  through  the 
radiant  dimness  of  their  own  tears.  Poor  Doctor  Steddon 
had  never  a  chance  with  her.  His  own  tears  pattered  down 
on  her  hat.  The  blessed  damozel  "heard"  his  tears.  They 
would  probably  spot  the  crown. 

Mem  said  that  it  was  a  crime  for  her  to  have  taken  her 
mother  on  East  and  left  him  alone,  but  he  protested: 

"D'you  suppose  I  wanted  my  little  girl  traveling  in  those 
wicked  cities  all  by  herself?" 

This  gladdened  Mem  exquisitely.  It  showed  that,  for  all 
her  wanton  career,  she  was  still  in  her  father's  eyes  an 
innocent  child  who  must  be  protected  from  the  world.  Of 
course,  it  was,  rather,  the  world  that  needed  to  be  protected 
from  her.  But  she  would  not  disturb  his  sweet  delusion. 

He  said  he  wished  he  might  have  gone  along  and  seen 
great  cities  he  had  never  seen.  All  cities  were  Carcassones 
to  him.  He  spoke  of  the  anonymous  benefactor,  the  con 
science-stricken  stranger  who  had  sent  him  money  through 
Doctor  Bretherick.  But  he  could  not  use  that  money  for 
travel;  it  was  for  the  church,  and  he  sighed,  "The  good  man 
has  forgotten  to  send  the  last  installment  as  he  promised." 

Mem  gave  a  start  and  had  almost  said:  "I  forgot  all 
about  it  in  the  rush  of  leaving.  I'll  give  it  to  you  now." 

She  checked  herself  so  abruptly  that  she  was  not  quite 
sure  that  she  had  not  spoken.  She  seemed  to  hear  the  echo 
of  her  words. 

Her  father  was  called  away  for  a  moment  to  speak  to  an 
old  parishioner,  and  Mem  said  to  her  mother: 

"This  is  exactly  what  we  call  a  'situation'  in  the  business. 
The  audience  knows  something  the  principal  actor  doesn't 
know.  If  poppa  had  found  out  that  I  was  the  remorseful 
gentleman  he'd  have  dropped  dead." 

He  came  back  with  the  parishioner,  who  had  begged  for 
the  honor  of  an  introduction  to  his  famous  daughter.  The 
old  man  had  once  wished  that  she  had  died  before  she  went 
so  wrong,  but  now  he  was  plainly  very  glad  indeed  that  she 
had  been  spared.  He  fluttered  like  a  hen  whose  duckling 
has  swum  the  pond  and  come  back  to  the  wing. 


394  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

The  parishioner  moved  on  at  last,  leaving  embarrassment. 

Doctor  Steddon  was  afraid  to  ask  his  daughter  the  details 
of  her  new  life,  lest  she  should  tell  him.  She  could  not  think 
of  much  to  say  that  would  be  certain  not  to  shock  him. 
The  reunion  was  too  blissful  to  be  risked. 

At  length,  a  very  long  length,  the  south-bound  train  drew 
in  and  took  them  aboard.  They  watched  the  landscape 
and  indulged  in  flurries  of  small  talk  that  rushed  and  died 
like  flaws  of  wind  on  the  river.  Now  it  was  the  Mississippi 
that  streamed  south  in  a  burly  leisure,  while  the  train  flew 
noisily. 


CHAPTER  LX 

AND  finally  Calverly  came  up  along  the  track  and  stopped 
at  the  station.  The  place  shocked  Mem  by  its  shabbi- 
ness  and  its  pettiness.  When  she  left  it  she  had  never  seen 
a  city  and  she  was  afraid  of  her  home  town.  Now  her  eyes 
were  acquainted  with  the  cyclopean  architecture  of  New 
York,  the  gardened  mansions  of  Pasadena,  and  the  maelstrom 
streets  of  Chicago. 

Yet  she  was  as  shy  before  the  crowds  that  waited  for  her 
as  they  of  her.  The  mayor  had  come  down  to  give  her  wel 
come.  He  was  as  shabby  as  the  sheriff  in  a  Western  movie, 
but  he  was  the  village's  best,  and  he  used  his  largest  words 
in  a  little  speech,  as  soon  as  he  could  push  through  the  mob 
of  Steddon  children  that  devoured  Mem  and  their  mother. 

The  manager  of  the  Calverly  Capitol,  with  its  capacity 
of  two  hundred,  brushed  the  mayor  aside  and  claimed  Mrs. 
Steddon  and  his  prize.  He  had  a  carriage  waiting  for  her, 
and  a  room  at  the  hotel  in  case  the  parsonage  was  over 
crowded. 

Doctor  Steddon  grew  Isaian  as  he  stormed  back: 

"My  daughter  stays  in  her  own  home!" 

This  brought  Mem  snuggling  to  his  elbow,  and  from  that 
sanctuary  she  greeted  her  old  Sunday-school  teacher,  several 
of  the  public-school  teachers,  an  old  negro  janitor,  a  number 
of  young  men  and  women  who  called  her  by  her  first  name. 

Two  or  three  of  the  girls  had  been  belles  of  the  town  and 
she  had  looked  on  them  with  awe  for  their  beauty,  their 
fine  clothes,  and  their  fast  reputations.  Now  they  seemed 
startlingly  dubby,  gawky,  silly ;  and  now  the  awe  was  theirs. 

Mem  noted  that  her  own  sisters  were  dubbier,  gawkier, 
sillier  still — except  Gladys,  who  had  matured  amazingly, 
and  in  whose  eyes  and  mouth  and  ill-furbished  roundnesses 


396  SOULS    FOR   SALE 

Mem's  experience  saw  a  terrifying  latent  voluptuousness 
and  a  capacity  for  fierce  emotions. 

The  first  resolve  Mem  made  was  to  buy  her  sisters  clothes 
worthy  of  them  and  of  her  own  high  rank. 

Just  as  she  was  stepping  into  a  waiting  automobile  Doctor 
Bretherick  came  along,  happened  by  with  a  very  badly  acted 
pretense  of  surprise.  Mem  told  him  that  she  wanted  to  come 
over  and  have  him  look  at  her  throat.  She  coughed  for  con 
viction's  sake  and  he  warned  her  that  there  was  a  lot  of  flu. 
goin'  about. 

The  car  moved  off  and  she  felt  as  if  she  were  passing 
through  a  wooden  toy  town.  Her  father's  church  looked 
about  to  fall  over.  It  was  not  half  so  big  as  she  remembered 
it,  and  dismally  in  need  of  paint. 

And  the  home!  Was  it  possible  that  the  old  fence  was  so 
near  the  porch,  and  the  porch  so  small?  Once  it  had  been  a 
grot  of  romantic  gloom,  deep  and  fatal  enough  to  bring  about 
her  damnation. 

With  a  sudden  stab  she  remembered  Elwood  Farnaby 
and  the  far-off  girl  that  he  had  loved  too  madly  well  in  that 
moonlit  embrasure.  How  little  and  pitiful  that  Mem  had 
been!  There  was  a  toyish  unimportance  in  her  very  fall, 
the  debacle  of  a  marionette  world.  But  Elwood  Farnaby 
was  great  by  virtue  of  his  absence  and  his  death.  He  was  a 
hero  now  with  Romeo  and  Leander  and  Abelard  and  the 
other  geniuses  of  passion  whose  shadows  had  grown  giganti 
cally  long,  in  the  sunset  of  a  tragic  punishment  for  their  ardors. 

She  stumbled  as  she  mounted  the  steps,  and  there  was  a 
misery  in  her  breast.  Then  the  house  opened  its  door  and 
took  her  in,  into  its  Lilliputian  hall  and  stairway.  She  laid 
off  her  hat  and  gloves  in  the  parlor,  with  the  dining  room 
alongside.  It  was  like  a  caricature  of  homeliness.  Just  such 
a  set  had  been  rejected  at  the  studio  because  it  was  a  bur 
lesque  on  such  a  home. 

Wonderment  at  the  hallucinations  of  her  youth  and  grati 
tude  even  for  the  disaster  that  had  hurled  her  out  of  the  jail 
filled  her  heart.  She  never  acted  more  desperately  than  in 
her  mimicry  of  the  emotions  of  rapture  at  her  coming  home. 

She  insisted  on  helping  to  get  the  midday  dinner.    Gladys 


SOULS    FOR   SALE  397 

protested,  but  Mem  was  frantic  for  something  to  keep  her 
hands  busy,  and  for  little  things  to  talk  about,  lest  her  dis 
may  at  the  humbleness  of  her  beginnings  insult  the  poor 
wretches  who  had  known  no  better. 

Her  mother  was  having  a  similar  battle,  though  the  return 
was  easier  since  she  had  never  gone  so  far  afield. 

At  the  dinner  table  the  old  preacher's  humble  grace  for 
the  bounty  of  the  Lord  saddened  Mem  again.  The  poor  old 
dear  had  suffered  every  hardship  and  known  nothing  of 
luxury,  yet  he  was  grateful  for  "bounty!" 

After  the  table  was  cleared  and  the  dishes  washed  and  put 
away,  Mem  escaped  on  the  pretext  of  a  visit  to  the  doctor. 
She  was  waylaid  by  old  friends  on  the  walks  and  hailed  from 
all  the  porches.  There  was  a  little  condescension  in  the  man 
ner  of  a  few  matrons  and  a  few  embittered  belles,  but  Mem 
knew  enough  to  take  this  as  the  unwitting  tribute  of  envy. 

She  found  Dr.  and  Mrs.  Bretherick  waiting  for  her.  The 
doctor  got  rid  of  his  wife  and  closed  the  door  on  Mem.  Then 
he  flung  up  his  hands  and  cried: 

"Well!" 

He  shook  his  shaggy  poll  and  mumbled  a  wide  grin,  and 
repeated  half  a  dozen  Well's  of  varied  meaning,  before  he 
exclaimed : 

"Well,  if  I'm  not  a  success  as  an  author,  manager,  and 
perdoocer  of  A-i  talent,  show  me  one.  Our  little  continuity 
has  certainly  worked  out  beyond  the  fondest  dreams  of 
author  and  star." 

His  star  took  less  pride  in  it  than  he.  Somehow  Mem  drew 
humiliation  from  the  lowliness  of  her  origin,  instead  of  pride. 
This  room  had  seen  her  first  confession  of  guilt.  In  this  room 
Elwood  Farnaby  had  made  his  last  battle  for  life. 

A  horrifying  thought  came  to  Mem:  if  he  had  not  died, 
she  would  have  become  his  wife  and  the  mother  of  his  pre 
mature  child.  She  would  have  been  a  laughing-stock, 
material  for  ugly  whispers  about  the  village.  And  she  would 
have  been  the  shabbiest  of  wives  even  here.  She  would 
never  have  known  fame  or  ease  or  wealth. 

"What  a  scenario  it  would  make!"  she  thought,  in  spite 
of  her  wrath  against  herself  for  harboring  such  an  infamous 


398  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

thought.  But  she  could  not  deny  her  mind  to  it.  Suppose 
a  story  were  written  around  her  life :  a  girl  in  her  plight  has 
a  choice  of  two  careers;  in  one  her  lover  lives,  makes  her  the 
partner  of  his  humble  obscurity  and  poverty,  and  she  becomes 
a  shabby,  life-broken  dowd;  in  the  other  her  lover  dies  and 
she  goes  on  alone  to  wealth,  beauty,  and  the  heights  of 
splendor.  Which  would  she  choose?  The  very  hesitation 
was  murderous.  Yet  how  would  she  choose?  Would  she 
kill  her  lover  or  let  him  live,  a  vampire  to  destroy  her  soul  ? 

She  felt  a  compulsion  to  penance  and  a  humbling  of  herself 
at  the  grave  of  her  thwarted  husband.  She  was  afraid  to  walk 
through  the  streets  to  the  cemetery,  and  she  asked  the  doctor 
to  drive  her  thither  in  the  little  car  he  now  affected. 

He  consented  and  rose  to  lead  the  way.  She  checked  him 
and  took  out  her  purse. 

"I  want  to  give  you  the  installment  I  forgot,  of  the  con 
science  money.  Please  get  it  to  papa  as  soon  as  you  can. 
And  here's  a  little  extra." 

The  doctor  took  the  bills  with  a  curious  smile.  She  seemed 
to  feel  his  sardonic  perplexity  as  she  mused  aloud  along  a 
well-thought  path. 

"If  I  hadn't  been  a  fallen  woman  I  couldn't  have  saved 
papa's  church  from  ruin.  How  do  you  explain  it?  What's 
the  right  and  wrong  of  it  all?" 

The  old  doctor  shook  his  head: 

"I'm  no  longer  fool  enough,  honey,  to  try  to  explain 
anything  that  happens  to  us  here.  I  don't  even  wonder 
about  what's  going  to  happen  to  us  hereafter,  if  anything. 
As  for  right  and  wrong — humph!  I  can't  tell  'em  apart. 
When  some  terrible  calamity  comes,  your  father  says,  '  It  is 
God's  will;  he  moves  in  a  mysterious  way!'  Well,  I  let  it  go 
at  that  for  good  luck,  too.  I  neither  thank  nor  blame  Any 
body  for  anything,  and  I  don't  pray  to  Anybody  to  make  it 
come  out  the  way  I  want  it.  According  to  one  line  of  think 
ing,  your  misstep  was  the  divine  plan.  According  to  another, 
good  can  never  come  out  of  evil.  Of  course  we  know  it  does, 
every  day;  and  evil  out  of  good.  The  only  folks  who  know 
things  know  'em  because  they  think  that  being  pig  headed 
is  being  knowing.  It's  too  much  for  the  wise  ones.  So  let's 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  399 

let  it  alone  and  make  the  best  of  what  comes.  We're  only 
human,  after  all,  so  let's  be  as  human  as  we  can,  and  I  guess 
that's  about  as  divine  as  we'll  ever  get  Down  Here." 

He  led  her  out  to  his  woeful  little  tin  wagon  and  they  went 
larruping  through  the  streets,  out  into  the  cemetery.  That 
at  least  had  increased  in  population  and  some  new  monu 
ments  brightened  it,  set  like  paper  weights  to  hold  down  poor 
bodies  that  the  wind  might  else  blow  away. 

A  few  mourners  were  moving  about  planting  flowers, 
clipping  grass,  lifting  away  old  scraps  of  paper,  or  just 
brooding  over  what  the  earth  had  gathered  back  unto  itself. 
They  looked  up  startled  and  offended  at  the  profaning  clatter 
of  Doctor  Bretherick's  car. 

Some  of  them  Mem  recognized.  One  or  two  women,  whose 
grief  was  so  old  that  it  was  almost  comfortable,  waved  to 
her.  She  had  a  sudden  fear  that  if  she  paused  to  kneel  at 
Elwood's  mound  and  worship  there  she  would  start  a  wonder 
that  intuition  would  change  to  ugly  surmise.  The  scandal 
had  died  before  its  birth,  like  the  still-born  child.  It  would 
do  Mem  little  harm,  for  she  had  been  the  victim  of  much 
harsh  talk  and  was  always  under  that  cloud  of  suspicion 
that  envelops  all  stage  people  in  the  eyes  of  the  conventional. 

But  El  wood  in  his  grave  ought  to  be  spared  from  such  a 
resurrection.  The  tongues  of  the  busybodies  must  not  dig 
him  up  and  play  the  ghoul  with  him. 

In  a  panic  of  indecision  as  to  her  true  duty,  she  recognized 
old  Mrs.  Farnaby  mourning  by  a  little  hillock.  Swaying 
near  her  was  her  husband,  old  Fall-down  Farnaby,  still 
somehow  capable  of  intoxication. 

The  doctor  knew  better  than  to  pause  at  all,  and  Mem's 
only  rite  of  atonement  was  a  glance  of  remorseful  agony  cast 
toward  Elwood's  resting  place.  It  showed  her  that  the 
founder  of  her  fortunes  was  honored  only  by  a  wooden  head 
board  already  warped  and  sidelong. 

' '  One  last  favor, ' '  she  mumbled  to  Doctor  Bretherick.  ' '  Get 
a  decent  tombstone  for  the  poor  boy  and  let  me  pay  for  it." 

"All  right,  honey,"  said  the  doctor.  And  the  car  jangled 
out  of  the  gates  again  into  the  secular  road. 

And  that  was  that. 


CHAPTER  LXI 

WHEN  she  reached  home,  Mem  was  so  beaten  down 
and  frustrated  that  she  begged  permission  to  rest 
awhile  in  bed  for  the  night's  ordeal.  At  the  supper  table  the 
younger  children  beset  her  with  questions.  Gladys  was 
particularly  curious  and  searching  in  her  inquiries. 

Then  came  the  hour  of  the  theatergoing.  Nobody  had 
dared  to  ask  Doctor  Steddon  if  he  would  accompany  his 
family.  He  had  not  made  up  his  own  mind.  He  dared  not. 

The  family  tacitly  assumed  that  his  conscience  or  his 
pride  forbade  him  to  appear  in  the  sink  of  iniquity  he  had 
so  often  denounced. 

The  family  bade  him  good-by  and  left  him,  but  had  hardly 
reached  the  gate  when  he  came  pounding  after.  He  flung 
his  arms  about  Mem's  shoulders  and  cast  off  all  his  offices 
except  that  of  a  father,  chuckling: 

"Where  my  daughter  goes  is  good  enough  for  me!" 

He  made  almost  more  of  a  sensation  in  the  theater  than 
Mem.  There  was  applause  and  cheering  and  even  a  slow 
and  awkward  rising  to  the  feet  until  the  whole  packed  audi 
torium  was  erect  and  clamorous. 

Seats  of  honor  were  reserved  for  the  great  star  and  the 
family  that  reflected  her  effulgence.  As  soon  as  they  were 
seated  the  young  woman  who  flailed  the  piano  began  to 
batter  the  keys,  and  Mem's  latest  picture  began  to  flow  down 
the  screen. 

She  could  feel  at  her  elbow  the  rigid  arm  of  her  father 
undergoing  martyrdom.  She  felt  it  wince  as  her  first  close-up 
began  to  glow,  her  huge  eyes  pleading  to  him  in  a  glisten  of 
superhuman  tears.  The  arm  relaxed  as  he  surrendered  to 
the  wonder  of  her  beauty.  It  tightened  again  when  danger 
threatened  her,  and  she  could  hear  his  sigh  of  relief  when  she 
escaped  one  peril,  his  gasp  as  she  encountered  another. 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  401 

He  was  like  a  child  playing  with  his  first  toy,  hearing  his 
first  fairy  story.  He  was  entranced.  She  heard  him  laugh 
with  a  boyishness  she  had  never  associated  with  him.  She 
heard  him  blow  his  nose  with  a  blast  that  might  have  shaken 
a  wall  in  Jericho.  A  sneaking  side  glance  showed  her  that 
his  eyes  were  dripping.  And  when  the  applause  broke  out 
at  the  finish  of  the  picture,  she  heard  his  great  hands  making 
the  loudest  thwacks  of  all.  This  was  heartbreaking  bliss  for 
her. 

Then  the  manager  appeared  on  the  narrow  stage  and 
spoke  of  the  honor  of  having  with  them  the  great  star  of 
whom  Calverly  was  so  proud,  and  he  took  great  pleasure 
in  interdoocing  Miss  Remember  Steddon,  "America's  sweet 
heart." 

This  stolen  attribute  embarrassed  Mem  only  a  moment 
in  the  sea  of  embarrassments  that  swallowed  her.  She 
hardly  knew  how  she  reached  the  stage  or  what  happened 
there.  Whatever  she  said,  she  said  to  her  father,  staring 
down  at  him  as  so  often  from  the  choir  gallery.  His  eyes 
were  bright  with  a  layman's  ecstasy  in  a  child's  glory. 

She  came  down  and  made  her  way  slowly  through  a 
phalanx  of  friends  with  out  thrust  fingers,  snatching  at *  the 
hem  of  her  fame,  eager  to  be  able  to  say,  "  I  shook  hands  with 
Remember  Steddon  once." 

The  family  rode  home  in  state,  the  children  and  the 
mother  loud  in  comment,  the  father  silent.  The  old  par 
son  had  to  think  it  all  out.  Once  at  home,  he  sent  the 
children  up  to  bed  and  held  Mem  and  her  mother  with  his 
glittering  eye  for  a  long  while  before  he  delivered  his 
sermon.  It  was  his  nature  to  be  forever  praying  for  for 
giveness  for  something,  and  now  his  very  pride  took  the 
form  of  contrition: 

"My  beloved  wife  and  daughter,  I — ahem,  ahum!  I 
want  to  plead  for  the  forgiveness  of  you  both.  I  have  been 
wrong  headed  and  stiff  necked  as  so  often,  but  now  I  am 
humbled  before  you  in  spite  of  all  my  pride.  It  has  just 
come  over  me  that  when  God  said,  'Let  there  be  light,'  and 
there  was  light,  he  must  have  had  in  mind  this  glorious 
instrument  for  portraying  the  wonders  of  his  handiwork. 


402  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

Our  dear  Redeemer  used  the  parable  for  his  divine  lessons, 
and  it  has  come  to  me  that  if  he  should  walk  the  earth  again 
to-day  he  would  use  the  motion  pictures. 

"You  have  builded  better  than  you  knew,  perhaps,  my 
child — and  now  I  ask  you  to  pardon  me  for  being  ashamed 
of  you  when  I  should  have  been  proud.  You  were  using  the 
gifts  that  Heaven  sent  you  as  Heaven  meant  you  to  use 
them.  Your  eloquence  is  far  greater  than  mine  has  ever 
been.  Never  have  I  seen  the  beauty  of  purity  amid  tempta 
tion  so  vividly  brought  home. 

"I  would  not  presume  to  seem  to  criticize  you,  my  darling, 
but  I  implore  you  to  keep  your  heart  and  your  art  clean, 
not  only  for  your  own  precious  sake,  but  for  the  sake  of  the 
people  whom  you  are  helping  in  their  own  struggles  with 
temptation.  Your  art  is  sacred  and  you  can't,  you  won't, 
sully  it  in  your  life.  God  forgive  me  for  my  unbelief  and 
send  you  happiness  and  goodness  and  a  long,  long  usefulness 
in  the  path  you  have  elected." 

He  rose  and  bent  down  to  kiss  Mem  on  the  brow.  Then 
he  escaped  into  his  study,  leaving  the  two  women  to  weep 
in  each  other's  arms  with  a  joyous  abandonment. 

None  of  her  father's  thunderings  against  wantonness, 
none  of  his  chantings  about  the  divine  delights  of  self-denial, 
ever  had  such  influence  upon  Mem's  soul  as  his  meek  sur 
render  before  her  power  as  an  artist. 

Nothing  has  ever  made  anybody  want  to  be  good  so  much 
as  the  rewards,  the  praise  for  having  been  good. 

That  night  Mem  knelt  again  by  her  old  bed  and,  on  knees 
unaccustomed  to  prayer,  implored  strength  to  keep  her  gift 
like  a  chalice,  a  grail  of  holiness.  She  woke  with  an  early- 
morning  resolve  to  be  the  purest  woman  and  the  devoutest 
artist  that  ever  lived. 

Other  hours  and  other  influences  brought  other  moods, 
but  consecration  was  her  spirit  now. 

The  next  day  she  left  the  town  with  all  its  blessings,  no 
longer  a  scapegoat,  sin  laden,  limping  into  the  wilderness, 
but  a  missionary  God-sped  into  the  farthest  lands  of  the 
earth. 

It  seemed  that  all  Calverly  was  there  to  wring  her  hand 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  403 

and  waft  her  salutations.  The  family  was  woebegone  at 
losing  her — all  but  Gladys,  who  wore  a  mysterious  smile 
that  puzzled  them. 

The  conductor  called,  "All  aboard!"  and  hasty  farewells 
were  taken  in  clench  of  hand  and  awkward  kiss. 

Mem  ran  to  the  rear  platform  and  waved  and  waved 
lengthening  signals  of  love  to  her  dwindling  family.  She 
noted  the  absence  of  Gladys  and  wondered  at  it  as  she  went 
to  her  drawing-room.  There  she  found  the  girl  ensconced  in 
fairy  triumph,  smiling  like  a  pretty  witch. 

"What  on  earth  are  you  doing  here?"  Mem  cried. 

"Going  to  Los  Angeles  with  you.  I  may  never  be  great 
like  you,  but  I'm  going  to  have  a  mighty  good  time  trying. 
Can  you  blame  me  for  running  away  from  that  graveyard 
when  I  see  what  came  to  you?" 

How  could  Mem  blame  her  ?  How  could  she  fail  to  under 
stand  her  and  to  promise  her  help  ?  All  the  world  was  filled 
with  runaway  girls  striking  out  for  freedom  and  for  wealth 
and  renown.  Mem's  little  sister  was  only  another  in  the 
multitude  and  she  was  so  pretty,  so  desirable,  delectable, 
magnetic,  that  her  future  looked  all  roses. 

"  I'm  jealous  of  you, * '  Mem  said.  ' '  You'll  ruin  my  chances, 
you're  so  much  better  looking,  and — and — ' 

"Oh,  you!"  Gladys  laughed  in  disclaimer. 

There  were  many  questions  to  exchange  and  Mem  soon 
learned  that  her  sister  had  flung  off  the  chains  that  one  or 
two  ardent  lovers  had  tried  to  fasten  about  her.  She  had 
substituted  for  the  old  saws  the  modern  instances.  She  had 
changed  the  old  ditty  to  run,  "The  boy  I  left  behind  me." 
Gladys  was  not  beginning  her  future  with  the  dark  groping 
fearsomeness  of  Mem's.  Mem  had  been  like  a  pioneer  who 
fights  old  Wilderness  and  makes  the  path  easy  for  the  fol 
lowers. 

When  Mem,  with  a  last  faltering  reproach,  asked  her  sister 
if  she  were  wise  to  toss  aside  the  devotion  of  a  good  man, 
Gladys  laughed. 

"Let  love  wait!  The  men  have  kept  us  waiting  for  thou 
sands  of  years,  till  they  were  ready.  Now  let  them  wait  for 
us." 


4o4  SOULS    FOR    SALE 

There  was  no  gainsaying  this.  It  had  been  Mem's  own 
feeling  when  she  left  Los  Angeles  and  her  lovers  there. 

Consternation  must  be  rife  at  home  in  Calverly  where 
Gladys's  elopement  was  doubtless  realized  by  now,  but 
there  would  be  more  consternation  in  the  hearts  of  countless 
men  when  the  fascinations  of  the  Steddon  sisters  should 
shine  upon  them  from  the  silver  sheet. 

Mem  resolved  to  save  her  sister  from  the  anguishes  she 
had  known  in  her  own  pilgrimage.  She  felt  already  a  veteran 
and  a  guide  with  a  diploma  from  the  college  of  life.  Her 
first  thought  had  been  a  remorseful  feeling  that  she  had  not 
only  gone  wrong,  but  had  led  her  own  sister  astray,  as  well. 
Now  she  felt  that  she  had  led  her  sister  out  of  the  dark  into 
the  light. 

She  had  been  somehow  rescued  from  oblivion  into  the 
higher  opportunities.  She  would  make  her  name  famous 
and  keep  it.  If  she  ever  got  a  husband  she  would  still  keep 
her  name  and  not  use  his,  except  for  the  sweet  purposes  of 
domesticity. 

Life  had  not  plucked  her  to  fling  away  or  merely  to  adorn 
the  buttonhole  of  some  lover.  Life  had  transplanted  her 
into  a  garden  where  the  choicest  flowers  bloomed.  She  would 
make  herself  the  rosiest  rose  that  she  could.  She  would 
yearn  upward  toward  the  sun  and  spread  the  incense  of  her 
soul  as  far  as  the  winds  of  the  world  would  carry  it.  And 
when  she  died  she  would  leave  her  name  and  her  face  in 
immortal  pictures  of  deathless  motion. 

She  had  sinned — indeed,  her  life  had  been  redeemed  from 
nullity  through  her  sin  at  home.  She  would  sin  again — but 
then  everybody  sinned  again  and  again.  But  she  would 
make  atonement  by  entertainment,  purging  her  soul,  not 
by  hiding  in  the  wilderness,  but  by  shining  like  a  little  sun 
around  the  world,  blessing  the  world  with  sympathy  and  the 
nobility  of  tears  shed  for  another's  sorrows. 

Let  love  wait,  then,  till  she  had  made  the  best  of  herself. 
And  then  let  love  not  demand  that  she  bow  her  head  and 
shrivel  in  his  shadow;  but  let  him  bloom  his  best  alongside. 

She  wondered  who  that  fellow  of  her  destiny  would  be — 
Tom  Holby,  maybe — Austin  Boas,  or  still  another  perhaps; 


SOULS    FOR    SALE  405 

or  others,  perhaps,  including  him!  or  them!  In  any  case  he 
(or  they)  had  better  behave  and  play  fair!  As  for  being  a 
mother,  let  that  wait,  too.  She  was  going  to  mother  the 
multitudes  and  tell  them  stories  to  soothe  them. 

There  was  far  more  in  this  dream  than  vanity,  far  more 
than  selfishness.  The  hope  of  the  world  lay  therein,  for  the 
world  can  never  advance  farther  than  its  women. 

She  had  a  soul  to  sell  and  it  was  all  her  own,  and  she  was 
going  to  market. 

The  dawn  was  hers  for  conquest.  Mankind  was  her  lover 
and  her  beloved.  That  one-man  passion  called  love  could 
tarry  until  at  least  the  late  forenoon. 


THE    END 


14  DAY  USE 

RETURN  TO  DESK  FROM  WHICH  BORROWED 

LOAN  DEPT. 

RENEWALS  ONLY — TEL  NO.  642-3405 

This  book  is  due  on  the  last  date  stamped  below,  or 

on  the  date  to  which  renewed. 
Renewed  books  are  subject  to  immediate  recall. 


(*f»f*        f>  .  _  -,_ 

FEB    319705 

8 

H£C£1Y^D 

FEB1170^PM 

t***w  iwf  * 

SENT  ON  ILL 

MAY  fl  8  1998 

U.  C.  BERKELEY 

LD21A-60m-6,'69 
(J9096slO)476-A-32 


General  Library 

University  of  California 

Berkeley 


496444 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 


